A  SOLDIER  IN 
THE  PHILIPPINES 


BY 

N.  N.  FREEMAN 

(PRIViJrB,    U.  S.  A.) 


•     1       o 


F.  TENNYSON  NEELY  CO. 


14  Fifth  Avenue  ^ 

NEW  YORK  ,.   V\ 


.A-^         06  Queen  Street 
^ \ ^     ^  LONDON 


F75 


paESERVATtOr* 
COPY  ADDED 
ORJGlNALTtDBE 

RETAINED 

^   GARPENTIER 

Copyright,  1901, 

by 

D.  L.  FREEMAN, 

in  the 

United  Statet 

and 
Great  Britain. 

Entered  at 
Stationers"  Hall,  London. 

Ail  Righu  Reserved. 


^  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 


A  SOLDIER  m  THE  PHILIPPINES, 


CHAPTER  I. 

Needom  Freeman,  in  the  United  States  regular 
army  during  the  years  1898-1900,  was  born  in  the 
quiet  little  country  village  of  Barrettsville,  Dawson 
County,  Ga.,  on  the  25th  of  September,  1874. 

Many  things  have  been  said  and  written  of 
army  life  during  the  Spanish-American  war,  but 
usually  from  the  officers'  point  of  view.  As 
a  matter  of  fact  the  ideas  of  a  private 
if  spoken  or  written  are  unbelieved  simply  be- 
cause the  prestige  of  office  was  not  attached,  and 
receives  but  little  credit. 

The  early  part  of  my  life  was  passed  in  and 
near  the  little  village  of  my  birth.  Working  on 
the  farm  and  attending  the  village  school  a  few 
months  during  the  time  when  farming  operations 
were  suspended,  consumed  about  all  my  time.  My 
father  being  a  poor  man  with  a  large  family  and 
unable  to  give  his  children  the  benefit  of  any  ad- 
vanced education,  it  fell  to  my  lot  to  receive  but 
little  instruction.  I  was  the  eighth  child  in  a 
family  of  thirteen — five  sons  and  eight  daughters. 

Having  attained  the  long  awaited  age  of  twenty- 
one,  when  most  young  men  are  buoyant  and  full 
of  hope  and  ambition,  I  turned  my  thoughts  west- 

M183607 


2        A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

ward,  where  I  hoped  to  make  my  fortune.  I 
gathered  together  my  few  possessions  and  pro- 
ceeded to  Texas,  arriving  at  Alvarado,  Texas,  the 
second  day  of  November,  1895. 

Obtaining  employment  on  a  farm,  my  old  occu- 
pation was  resumed  for  eighteen  weeks,  but  find- 
ing this  too  commonplace  and  not  fulfilling  my 
desires  nor  expectations,  the  farm  work  was  once 
more  given  up. 

I  obtained  a  position  with  a  wrecking  crew  on 
the  Santa  Fe  Eailroad.  For  twelve  months  I 
worked  with  this  crew,  then  /,ave  it  up  in  disgust. 

A  few  weeks'  employment  in  the  cotton  mills  of 
Dallas,  Texas,  were  sufficient  to  satisfy  me 
with  that  sort  of  work. 

I  next  obtained  employment  with  the  street  rail- 
road of  Dallas,  filling  the  position  of  motorman, 
which  I  held  for  three  months.  One  night,  while 
with  several  friends,  the  subject  of  enlisting  in 
the  army  was  discussed;  this  stronr^ly  appealed  to 
me,  and  studying  the  matter  further,  I  became 
enthused  over  the  idea.  I  determined  to  enlist 
at  once.  My  position  as  motorman  with  the  street 
railroad  company  was  given  up.  My  salary  was 
forty-five  dollars  a  month,  as  against  one-third 
that  amount  in  the  army,  but  this  made  little 
difference  to  me.  I  was  anxious  to  be  a  soldier 
and  live  the  life  of  one. 

I  proceeded  to  the  recruiting  office  in  Dallas  to 
stand  an  examination,  was  weighed,  then  measured 
all  over,  every  scar  was  measured,  my  complexion 
was  noted,  my  age,  place  of  birth  and  all  about  my 
people  were  taken.  My  fi-ngers  and  toes  were 
twisted  and  almost  pulled  off.    It  occurred  to  me 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.        3 

that  possibly  my  examiners  thought  my  fingers 
and  toes  might  be  artificial.  After  part  of  two 
days'  weighing,  measuring,  finger  pulling,  toe- 
twisting  and  questioning  I  was  pronounced  sub- 
ject and  sent  to  the  St.  George  Hotel,  in  Dallas, 
to  await  further  orders.  Of  twelve  applicants 
who  were  standing  the  same  examination  I  was 
the  only  successful  one.  I  enlisted  under  Lieu- 
tenant Charles  Flammil  for  a  service  of  three 
years,  unless  discharged  before  the  expiration  of 
that  time.  I  was  to  obey  all  the  orders  of  my 
superior  officers,  which  meant  every  officer  from 
corporal  up. 

From  Dallas  I  was  sent  to  Fort  Mcintosh,  south- 
west of  Dallas,  on  the  border  of  Texas  and  Mexico, 
on  the  Kio  Grande.  My  long  cherished  hope  was 
now  being  fulfilled.  I  had  from  a  mere  boy  had  a 
desire  to  be  one  of  Uncle  Sam's  soldiers  and  fight 
for  my  country.  I  had  now  entered  the  service 
for  three  years  and  will  let  the  reader  judge  for 
himself  whether  or  not  he  thinks  that  I  should  be 
satisfied  with  the  service  and  experience  of  a 
soldier. 

Fort  Mcintosh  is  in  Laredo,  Texas.  Here  I  was 
assigned,  upon  my  arrival,  to  Company  A,  Twen- 
ty-third United  States  Infantry.  I  had  only  been 
there  a  few  days  when  Company  A  was  ordered 
out  on  a  practice  march  of  one  hundred  and 
twenty  miles.  Of  course  I  wanted  to  go,  thinking 
it  would  be  a  picnic.  I  only  had  a  few  days' 
drilling  at  the  fort,  and  that  was  all  I  ever  had, 
but  I  was  anxious  to  go  on  this  march  with  my 
company,  and  Goodale,  called  "Grabby"  by  the 
men,  had  my  uniform  and  necessary  equipage 


4        A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

issued  to  me  and  Jet  me  go  with  the  company.  I 
learned  during  the  first  days'  march  its  object  was 
not  to  have  a  picnic,  but  just  to  try  us  and  pre- 
pare us  for  the  service  we  might  at  any  time  be 
called  upon  to  perform.  We  were  to  get  hardened 
a  little  by  this  practice  march. 

The  second  day  out  we  were  halted  every  hour 
and  rested  ten  minutes.  During  one  of  those 
rests  I  pulled  off  my  shoes  to  see  what  was  hurting 
my  feet.  I  found  on  each  of  my  heels  a  large 
blister  and  several  small  ones.  A  non-commis- 
sioned officer  saw  the  condition  of  my  feet  and 
ordered  me  into  the  ambulance.  I  was  afraid  the 
soldiers  would  laugh  at  me  for  falling  out.  First 
I  hesitated,  but  very  soon  I  had  plenty  of  com- 
pany in  the  ambulance. 

The  march  was  through  a  rough  country,  the 
roads  were  very  bad,  and  travel  was  difficult. 
Twenty  miles  a  day  through  chapparal  bushes  and 
cactus  is  a  good  day's  march  for  soldiers,  with  all 
their  equipage.  The  infantryman  carried  a  rifle, 
belt,  haversack  and  canteen.  Tents  were  pitched 
every  night  and  guards  stationed  around  the  camp 
to  keep  away  prowling  Mexicans  and  others  who 
would  steal  the  provisions  of  the  camp.  Tents 
were  struck  at  morning  and  everything  put  in 
readiness  for  the  day's  march.  The  company  was 
out  fifteen  days  on  that  practice  march  across  the 
plains.  Four  days,  however,  were  really  holidays. 
We  spent  them  hunting  and  fishing.  Fish  and 
game  were  plentiful.  A  few  deer  were  to  be  found, 
but  ducks  and  blue  quail  were  the  principal  game. 
The  comnany  returned  to  Fort  Mcintosh  on  the 
third  of  December. 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.        5 

I  had  to  be  drilled  as  a  recruit;  never  having 
had  any  military  training,  everything  was  new  to 
me.  I  was  drilled  hard  for  a  month  before  I  was 
assigned  to  the  company  for  duty.  That  month's 
drill  was  very  hard. 

After  I  was  assigned  for  duty  I  learned  some- 
thing new  about  military  affairs  every  day  for  a 
year.  The  manner  of  all  the  drill  masters  was 
very  objectionable  to  me  at  first;  I  did  not  like 
the  way  they  spoke  to  a  soldier  and  gave  com- 
mands, which,  if  disobeyed,  punishment  was  in- 
flicted. The  month  I  drilled  as  a  recruit  by  myself 
I  was  under  Sergeant  Eobert  Scott  of  my  company. 
During  that  time  I  thought  Sergeant  Scott  the 
most  unkind  man  I  had  ever  seen.  He  looked 
ugly  and  talked  harshly.  I  thought  he  meant 
every  word  he  said.  After  I  learned  how  the  com- 
mands were  given  and  was  taught  how  to  execute 
them,  it  seemd  very  simple  and  then  I  was  as- 
signed for  duty. 

When  my  time  came  to  serve  on  guard  duty  I 
did  not  understand  the  "general  orders"  and 
^'special  orders."  I  went  on  guard  perfectly  be- 
wildered with  the  instructions  given  me  about 
my  duties. 

I  did  not  know  what  to  do.  I  watched  for  the 
officer  of  the  day  to  make  his  round  and  give  orders 
every  day  and  night. 

Two  hours'  duty  on  post  was  the  time  we  stood 
guard  before  being  relieved  by  the  proper  author- 
ity. If  a  man  is  caught  sitting  down  while  on 
duty  he  is  severely  punished  by  being  placed  in  the 
guard  house,  and  sentenced  to  hard  labor  for  a 
long  time.    Sometimes  the  labor  sentence  runs  as 


6       A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

high  as  six  months  or  more,  according  to  the  grav- 
ity of  the  offense. 

I  was  very  careful  not  to  get  in  the  guard  house 
or  miss  roll  call,  having  to  pay  fines  or  working 
hard  all  day  with  a  sentry  over  me. 

Every  soldier  had  to  be  on  his  bunk  at  eleven 
o'clock  at  night ;  his  check  was  taken  and  delivered 
to  the  officer  of  the  day.  Nine  o'clock  was  bed 
time,  but  the  checks  were  not  taken  up  until  eleven. 
The  first  call  of  the  morning  was  sounded  at  a 
quarter  before  six,  when  we  must  answer  to  re- 
veille, followed  by  a  drilling  exercise  of  fifteen 
minutes.  After  breakfast  every  soldier  had  to 
sweep  under  his  bunk  and  prepare  it  and  himself 
for  inspection,  which  took  place  after  drill  hour, 
which  was  from  eight  to  nine  o'clock. 

A  gymnastic  drill  of  thirty  minutes  each  day,  ex- 
cept Saturday  and  Sunday,  was  given  the  company 
for  a  month,  then  for  three  months  this  was 
omitted,  then  another  month's  drill  was  given  us, 
and  then  the  same  intermission ;  thus  we  had  them 
alternately  the  whole  year. 

The  Sabbath  receives  but  little  notice  in  the 
army.     All  duties  went  on  just  as  any  other  day. 

Several  hours  every  day  were  unoccupied  by  the 
soldier's  duties.  The  men  could  amuse  themselves 
during  these  hours  by  reading  newspapers  and 
books,  as  a  very  good  library  was  at  hand.  Aside 
from  reading  were  such  amusements  as  billiards, 
cards  and  music.  These  became  monotonous  and 
disgusting  to  me,  and  in  less  than  two  months  I 
would  have  gladly  given  up  my  position,  but  I  was 
in  for  three  years,  and  had  to  stay  and  make  the 
best  of  it. 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 


CHAPTEK  11. 

The  Christmas  holidays  were  delightful  indeed 
for  soldiers,  no  tasks  to  perform  for  one  whole 
week,  except  guard  duty.  The  week  was  spent  in 
gambling  and  revelry. 

All  other  holidays  meant  hard  work  all  day  for 
soldiers;  usually  they  were  days  of  celebrating 
some  event  in  the  history  of  our  country  or  some 
man  must  be  honored,  and  homage  paid  to  his 
memory.  The  soldiers  on  these  occasions  had  to 
parade  and  march  along  the  streets  all  day.  Every 
holiday,  except  that  of  Christmas,  was  a  dreaded 
day  to  soldiers. 

April  first,  1898,  my  company  was  ordered  out 
on  the  target  range  for  practice.  We  had  had  but 
little  practice,  only  being  there  six  days  when 
orders  were  received  to  prepare  to  leave  our  post 
at  a  moment^s  notice.  Those  were  memorable  days. 
History  was  being  added  to,  or  rather  made,  almost 
daily.  Every  one  was  talking  of  war  with  Spain, 
its  results  and  possibilities.  Our  camp  was  in  a 
commotion,  expecting  war  to  be  declared  at  once. 
Everything  was  put  in  readiness  for  marching.  In 
this  condition  we  remained  until  April  seventeenth, 
when  orders  came  at  last  for  the  Twenty-third  to 
proceed  to  New  Orleans. 

The  city  of  Laredo  gave  our  regiment  a  grand 
banquet  before  we  left  there.    Every  man,  woman 


8        A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

and  child,  apparently,  who  could  get  out  to  see  U3 
off,  turned  out. 

The  Twenty-third  Eegiment  had  been  stationed 
at  Laredo  for  eight  years,  and  during  this  time 
great  attachment  had  been  formed  between  the  sol- 
diers and  citizens.  From  Laredo  to  San  Antonio 
was  a  long  run,  attended  by  nothing  of  interest. 
At  San  Antonio  the  citizens  demonstrated  their 
patriotism  and  hospitality  by  having  a  grand  ban- 
quet awaiting  our  arrival.  Every  man  seemed  to 
have  a  good  time  while  there.  Before  our  train 
left,  the  citizens  put  several  kegs  of  beer  in  every 
car.  This  was  appreciated  very  much,  as  beer 
seems  to  be  a  soldier's  favorite  beverage,  and  one 
that  he  will  have  if  he  has  money  and  is  where  it 
can  be  bought.  A  soldier  rarely  refuses  beer  when 
offered  to  him. 

From  San  Antonio  a  run  of  forty  hours  carried 
us  into  New  Orleans  on  April  nineteenth. 

For  a  month  we  were  there  on  guard  duty.  The 
majority  of  the  regiment  seemed  to  enjoy  their  stay 
in  New  Orleans,  but  for  me  it  was  anything  but 
enjoj^ment. 

The  citizens  were  very  kind  to  all  soldiers,  and 
seemed  to  regard  them  very  highly ;  when  one  went 
into  the  city  he  was  generally  given  all  the  beer 
he  wished  to  drink,  and  made  to  feel  welcome. 

Soldiers  care  very  little  for  anything,  and  do  not 
seem  to  care  very  much  for  themselves  or  for  each 
other.  They  know  that  the  responsibility  rests 
upon  the  officers,  and  that  food  and  clothing  will 
be  furnished  as  long  as  they  are  in  the  army. 
When  a  soldier  draws  his  pay,  usually  the  first 
thing  he  looks  for  is  some  place  to  gamble  and  get 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.       9 

rid  of  his  money  in  a  few  minutes,  then  he  can  be 
content.  He  is  restless  as  long  as  he  has  a  dollar, 
and  must  gamble  or  take  some  friends  to  a  saloon 
and  drink  it  up,  then  go  away  drunk. 

If  one  man  has  any  money  and  expects  to  keep 
it  he  must  not  let  others  know  of  it,  for  they  will 
expect  him  to  spend  it  for  all.  Generally  when 
one  man  has  any  money  it  is  free  to  all,  and  it  is 
enjoyed  as  long  as  it  lasts.  Soldiers  are  very 
generous  and  good-natured  men ;  if  not  that  way  at 
first  they  become  so  before  a  service  of  three  years 
expires. 

Army  life  is  dangerous  to  the  morals  of  many 
young  men.  They  will  take  up  some  bad  habits 
if  they  have  not  power  and  determination  to  con- 
trol themselves.  It  is  very  easy  for  a  man,  es- 
pecially a  young  man,  to  take  up  some  bad  habits 
and  lead  a  different  life  altogether  in  a  short  time 
after  he  becomes  a  soldier.  A  man  soon  learns  to 
drink  and  to  gamble,  although  he  may  have  known 
nothing  of  these  vices  before  his  enlistment.  I 
thought  that  a  soldier's  life  would  suit  me,  but 
after  a  service  of  three  years  I  can  truthfully  state 
that  it  was  not  what  I  desired.  Life  in  camps  at 
one  place  a  little  while,  then  at  another  place,  win- 
ter and  summer,  rain,  sleet  and  snow,  with  twenty 
men  in  one  wall  tent,  is  very  disagreeable,  un- 
healthy and  unpleasant.  I  spent  one  month  in 
camp  in  ISTew  Orleans  during  the  hot  weather,  and 
all  the  pleasure  I  had  there  was  fighting  mosqui- 
toes.    We  had  a  fierce  battle  with  them  every  night. 

My  regiment  had  all  the  service  at  New  Orleans 
they  wanted  in  the  line  of  guard  and  special  duty. 
Four  hours  of  hard  drilling  five  mornings  in  each 


10      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

week,  special  duty  in  the  afternoon,  then  half  of 
every  night  fighting  mosquitoes.  May  was  very 
hot.  I  believe  that  the  battalion  and  skirmish 
drills,  without  stopping  to  rest  or  to  get  water,  were 
very  injurious  to  the  soldiers. 

I  know  that  they  injured  my  feelings  very  much. 

I  was  a  private  in  Company  "A,'^  Captain  Good- 
dale  in  command.  I  thought  a  great  deal  of  my 
captain;  he  was  a  good  officer,  and  was  soon  pro- 
moted to  major  of  the  23d  Kegiment,  and  com- 
manded it  for  several  months.  He  was  then  pro- 
moted to  a  lieutenant-colonel  and  assigned  to  duty 
with  the  Third  Infantry,  then  in  the  Philippines. 
After  he  set  out  to  join  his  new  regiment  I  never 
saw  him  again.  He  was  the  first  captain  I  served 
under. 

Soldiers  who  served  under  good  officers  were 
fortunate,  but  if  they  had  bad  ones  they  were  soon 
in  trouble  and  had  a  hard  service.  A  son  of  Lieu- 
tenant-Colonel Goodale,  who  was  a  lieutenant,  was 
placed  in  command  of  Company  "A."  He,  like 
his  father,  was  a  good  officer,  and  soon  won  the 
confidence  and  esteem  of  his  company. 

After  the  declaration  of  war  between  the  United 
States  and  Spain,  the  23d  Regiment  was  recruited 
to  its  full  quota  of  one  hundred  men  for  each  of 
twelve  companies.  Four  new  companies  had  to  be 
formed,  which  were  called,  at  first,  skeleton  com- 
panies, because  they  only  had  a  few  men  trans- 
ferred to  them  from  the  old  ones. 

Non-commissioned  officers  were  transferred  to 
the  new  companies  and  placed  in  charge  of  the  re- 
cruits, to  drill  and  prepare  them  for  duty. 

Drilling  recruits  is  hard  work,   and  all  the 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      11 

officers  avoided  it  as  much  as  possible.  From  the 
20th  of  April  to  the  24th  of  May  we  had  nothing 
but  drill. 

When  Admiral  Dewey  destroyed  the  Spanis'h 
fleet  in  Manila  Bay,  orders  were  sent  to  the  23d 
Eegiment  to  proceed  at  once  to  San  Francisco. 
It  will  be  remembered  that  we  had  gone  to  New 
Orleans  under  orders  directing  our  regiment  to 
Cuba,  but  everything  had  changed  so  suddenly  that 
we  were  ordered  to  San  Francisco  to  be  in  readiness 
to  go  to  the  Philippines. 

The  orders  from  the  War  Department  were  re- 
ceived by  Colonel  French  on  the  night  of  the  23d 
of  May. 

The  following  day  everything  was  put  in  readi- 
ness for  leaving  for  San  Francisco,  but  to  hasten 
preparations  all  our  tents  were  struck  at  4  o^clock 
in  the  evening.  Soon  afterwards  it  commenced 
raining  for  the  first  time  during  our  stay  at  New 
Orleans.  Our  tents  were  down  and  we  had  no 
place  to  shelter  and  pass  the  night.  We  were 
ready  to  leave  next  morning.  I  never  saw  so  many 
wet  soldiers  before.  I  was  on  guard  and  saw  two 
hundred  men  or  more  go  into  stables  that  were 
near  our  camp.  We  were  camping  in  the  race 
track  of  the  city  fair  grounds,  which  were  sur- 
rounded by  a  great  many  stables.  This  was  rough 
fare,  and  I  could  not  say  whether  the  men  slept 
or  killed  mosquitoes.  One  thing  I  know  beyond 
question:  I  saw  the  toughest,  sleepiest  looking  lot 
of  men  next  morning  that  I  had  yet  seen  in  my 
military  service.  They  all  seemed  to  have  colds. 
To  add  to  our  discomfort  all  the  rations  had  been 
boxed  and  marked  for  shipping,  and  we  were  with- 


12      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

out  food  for  breakfast.  Those  who  had  any  money 
were  allowed  to  go  out  and  buy  something  to  eat. 
It  is  plain  that  if  a  man  had  no  money  he  went 
without  breakfast. 

The  men  were  all  formed  in  line  with  gun,  belt 
and  knapsack,  and  were  kept  standing  ready  to 
march  at  the  command,  until  one  o'clock  in  the 
evening  before  taking  up  the  march  of  three  miles 
to  the  railroad  station.  We  marched  through  the 
city  and  to  the  station  without  a  halt.  It  seemed 
to  me  the  hottest  day  I  ever  knew.  It  had  been 
nearly  twenty-four  hours  since  I  had  eaten,  and  I 
think  my  condition  was  no  worse  than  that  of  the 
whole  regiment,  with  but  very  few  exceptions. 

We  were  in  the  city  of  New  Orleans,  and  rations 
were  plentiful,  but  it  seemed  they  were  scarce  for 
us.  This,  however,  was  only  the  beginning  of  what 
we  were  to  get  accustomed  to  in  a  few  months. 

At  two  o'clock  on  the  35th  day  of  May,  our  regi- 
ment boarded  the  cars  of  the  Southern  Pacific 
Eailroad  and  set  out  on  its  journey  for  San  Fran- 
cisco. The  regiment  was  divided  into  three  sec- 
tions for  the  journey,  which  was  made  in  six  days. 

The  rations  issued  to  us  on  this  journey  con- 
sisted of  hard  tack,  canned  tomatoes,  canned 
salmon,  and  last,  but  not  least,  nor  more  desirable, 
canned  horse  meat.  To  use  a  soldier's  expression, 
such  "grub"  is  almost  enough  to  make  a  man  sick 
to  look  at,  but  this  made  no  difference,  we  had  to 
eat  it. 

I  have  seen  a  few  people  who  seemed  to  think  sol- 
diers were  not  human  beings  like  other  people. 
They  thought  they  could  endure  anything  and 
would  eat  any  kind  of  stuff  for  rations. 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      13 

While  eating  supper  one  evening  in  our  camp  at 
New  Orleans,  the  men  were  seated  in  their  usual 
manner  on  the  open  ground  grouped  around  their 
mess  kits  containing  their  rations;  a  young  lady 
with  her  escort  was  passing  through  the  camp  and 
observing  the  men  eating  supper,  remarked  to  her 
companion  that  the  soldiers  looked  like  men. 

She  had  possibly  never  seen  a  soldier  before. 

At  another  time  a  man  with  two  small  boys  were 
looking  over  our  camp  and  talking  about  the  sol- 
diers, when  one  of  the  little  boys  noticing  the  sol- 
diers eating,  and  seeming  to  be  interested  in  their 
manner  of  eating,  said:  "Papa,  will  soldiers  eat 
hay?''  His  youthful  curiosity  appeared  to  be 
fully  satisfied  by  the  father  answering:  "Yes,  if 
whiskey  is  put  on  it." 

Crowds  of  people  were  out  at  every  city  and 
town  we  passed  through  awaiting  our  arrival. 
Some  had  bouquets  of  beautiful  flowers  for  the 
soldiers  containing  notes  of  kind  words  and  wishes, 
and  signed  by  the  giver.  Some  gave  us  small 
baskets  of  nicely  prepared  rations.  These  were 
what  suited  us  most,  and  were  very  highly  appre- 
ciated by  every  one  who  was  fortunate  enough  to 
get  one. 

Our  train  passed  through  many  places  without 
stopping.  We  saw  crowds  of  people  at  those  places 
with  bouquets  and  various  gifts  of  kindness  and 
appreciation  which  they  had  no  opportunity  to 
give  us.  Whenever  our  train  stopped  it  would 
only  be  for  a  few  minutes,  and  there  was  only  time 
enough  to  receive  the  little  tokens  of  kindness  and 
good  will,  exchange  a  very  few  words,  and  WQ 
Vould  again  be  off,  , 


14      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines, 


CHAPTEK  III. 

Traveling  through  western  Texas  and  the 
plains  of  New  Mexico  is  very  mountainous  and 
lonely.  Villages  of  prairie  dogs  here  and  there 
seem  to  be  about  all  the  living  things  that  the 
traveler  sees.  These  little  animals  burrow  deep 
in  the  ground,  thousands  of  them  close  together, 
and  this  is  why  it  is  called  a  prairie  dog  town.  I 
was  told  that  these  little  dogs  live  mostly  on  roots 
and  drink  no  water.  I  give  this  as  it  was  told  me, 
and  do  not  know  how  true  it  is.  One  thing  which 
I  noticed  was  that  we  would  travel  two  or  three 
hundred  miles  and  not  see  any  water  courses. 

The  section  that  I  was  with  was  detained  about 
three  hours  at  El  Paso,  Texas,  on  account  of  some 
trouble  on  the  road  ahead  of  us.  Many  of  us  took 
advantage  of  this  to  look  about  the  city.  A  con- 
siderable change  of  temperature  was  noted,  it  being 
much  cooler  than  at  New  Orleans.  Before  the 
next  morning  we  were  passing  through  New 
Mexico.  It  was  cold  enough  to  wear  an  overcoat, 
but  as  we  only  had  blankets  every  man  had  one 
drawn  close  around  him,  and  was  then  shivering 
with  cold.  This  cold  weather  continued  until  the 
Rocky  Mountains  were  crossed,  and  we  began  to 
descend  the  Pacific  Slope. 

Crossing  the  deserts  of  Arizona  was  disagree- 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      15 

able.  The  white  sand  from  a  distance  looks  like 
snow,  and  is  so  dry  and  light  that  it  is  lifted 
about  by  the  wind.  Some  places  it  will  drift  sev- 
eral feet  deep.  The  railroad  company  kept  men 
employed  all  the  time  shoveling  sand  from  the 
track.  Nothing  but  some  scattering,  scrubby 
bushes  grows  in  the  deserts.  Almost  any  time 
looking  from  the  cars  there  seems  to  be  smoke 
away  off  in  the  distance.  This  is  nothing  but  the 
dry  sand  being  blown  about  by  the  wind. 

Where  the  railroad  crossed  the  deserts  they  are 
from  one  hundred  and  fifty  to  two  hundred  miles 
wide. 

The  first  place  we  stopped  after  crossing  the 
Rocky  Mountains  was  in  the  city  of  Los  Angeles, 
California.  The  good  people  of  Los  Angeles  had  a 
bountiful  supply  of  oranges  and  other  nice  fruit, 
which  were  given  to  the  soldiers,  who  enjoyed  them 
very  much.  Some  towns  where  we  stopped  the 
citizens  would  put  two  or  three  crates  of  oranges 
in  every  car  of  our  train. 

The  country  was  beautiful,  orange  groves  and 
orchards  of  different  kinds  were  numerous  and 
fine. 

California  is  the  most  beautiful  country  I  have 
seen  in  my  travels  from  Georgia  to  the  Philippine 
Islands. 

The  Oakland  Ferry  was  reached  about  ten 
o'clock  on  the  morning  of  the  first  day  of  June. 
Our  regiment  commenced  to  cross  at  once  over  to 
San  Francisco.  A  detail  was  left  to  take  our  sup- 
plies from  the  train  and  load  them  on  boats,  all 
the  balance  of  the  regiment  going  across.  My 
first  sergeant  was  unfriendly  to  me  and  included 


16      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

me  in  the  detail  as  a  mark  of  disrespect  to  me, 
although  it  was  not  my  time  to  be  placed  on  de- 
tail duty  according  to  the  system  of  rotating  that 
duty. 

Our  detail  worked  very  hard  for  about  two  hours 
and  seeing  no  prospect  of  dinner  we  crossed  over 
into  San  Francisco  to  find  something  to  eat.  We 
found  our  regiment  just  ready  to  enjoy  a  grand 
banquet  prepared  by  the  Eed  Cross  Society.  It 
was  prepared  near  the  piers  in  a  long  stone  build- 
ing ;  long  tables  were  piled  full  of  all  that  a  crowd 
of  hungry  soldiers  could  wish  for,  excellent  music 
was  furnished  while  we  did  full  justice  to  the 
feast  before  us.  The  Eed  Cross  has  spent  a  great 
deal  of  money  since  the  commencement  of  the 
Spanish- American  war;  it  has  accomplished  much 
toward  softening  the  horrors  of  war  by  caring  for 
the  sick  and  wounded,  providing  medicines  and 
necessaries  for  their  relief,  and  doing  many  chari- 
table acts  too  numerous  to  be  enumerated  here. 
Many  men  to-day  enjoying  health  and  strength 
were  rescued  from  what  must  have  been  an  un- 
timely grave  had  not  the  work  of  the  Eed  Cross 
come  to  their  relief  when  sick  or  wounded.  The 
army  physician  frequently  was  a  heartless,  and 
apparently  indifferent  man  about  the  ills  of  his 
patients.  While  at  Camp  Merritt  I  was  sick  for 
a  month.  The  physician  pronounced  the  malady 
fever;  he  did  not  seem  to  "care  about  my  recovery 
or  that  of  any  other  man ;  his  chief  concern  seemed 
to  be  that  of  obtaining  his  salary  of  one  hundred 
and  twenty-five  dollars  per  month.  Beyond  this 
his  interest  seemed  to  cease,  and  if  a  sick  soldier 
recovered  he  was  considered  lucky. 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      lH 

There  were  many  sick  men  in  Camp  Merritt  in 
the  months  of  June  and  July.  We  were  stationed 
there  for  five  months. 

Twenty-five  men,  myself  included,  volunteered 
to  be  transferred  from  Company  "A"  to  Company 
*^E."  This  transfer  was  made  on  the  sixth  of 
June,  and  was  done  to  fill  up  Company  "E''  to  its 
full  quota  for  the  purpose  of  going  to  Manila  on 
the  transport  Colon,  which  was  to  leave  San  Fran- 
cisco on  the  fifteenth  of  June. 

My  company,  now  Company  "E,"  was  being  pre- 
pared by  Captain  Pratt,  and  was  drilling  for  the 
last  time  in  the  United  States  before  going  to 
Manila.  I  unfortunately  became  ill  and  had  to 
be  left  at  Camp  Merritt  to  go  over  later.  It  was 
sad  news  to  me,  for  I  wanted  to  go  over  with  this 
expedition. 

One  battalion  of  the  23d  Kegiment  was  left  at 
Camp  Merritt,  which  included  my  old  company, 
to  which  I  was  assigned.  We  stayed  at  Camp 
Merritt  until  about  the  middle  of  August,  when 
orders  were  received  to  go  to  Manila.  By  the  time 
everything  was  packed  and  ready  to  strike  tents  a 
second  order  was  received,  not  to  go  to  Manila, 
but  to  go  to  Presidio,  in  San  Francisco,  and  await 
further  orders.  About  the  10th  of  October,  to 
our  great  joy,  orders  were  read  out  at  parade  in 
the  evening,  that  we  would  start  to  Manila  on  the 
seventeeth.  The  men  were  so  glad  they  threw  up 
their  hats  and  shouted  for  joy.  We  were  glad  to 
leave  the  cold,  foggy  and  disagreeable  climate  of 
San  Francisco,  and  delighted  that  we  were  going 
to  Manila,  which  was  then  the  central  battle  field. 
.   The  bad  climate,  incidentally  mentioned,  of  San 


18      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines* 

Francisco  seemed  to  be  only  local,  extending  along 
the  coast  for  only  a  few  miles. 

I  have  been  in  San  Francisco  when  it  was  cold 
enough  to  wear  an  overcoat,  and  going  across  the 
bay  to  Oakland  it  was  warm  enough  for  a  man  to 
be  comfortable  in  his  shirt  sleeves.  The  distance 
between  these  two  points  is  only  six  miles.  The 
native  citizens  of  San  Francisco,  and  those  who 
have  been  residents  for  many  years  and  accus- 
tomed to  the  damp,  foggy  atmosphere,  are  very 
healthy. 

But  this  climate  was  very  detrimental  to  the  sol- 
diers in  Camp  Merritt,  and  fatal  to  many. 

While  stationed  in  Camp  Merritt  I  spent  a  great 
deal  of  time  in  the  San  Francisco  park,  which  con- 
tained one  thousand  acres  of  land. 

A  great  variety  of  wild  animals  and  many  dif- 
ferent kinds  of  birds  were  there,  and  I  found  in  it 
a  great  deal  of  interest  and  amusement.  Crowds 
of  people  were  there  every  night.  Many  people 
were  there  for  the  purpose  of  committing  some 
crime.  People  were  frequently  being  sandbagged 
and  robbed,  or  sometimes  boldly  held  up,  and 
money  and  valuables  secured. 

I  knew  a  great  many  soldiers  who  were  robbed, 
sometimes  they  received  bruised  heads  just  by  loaf- 
ing in  the  park  at  night. 

No  reflection  is  intended  to  be  cast  upon  the 
police  whose  duty  was  in  the  park;  there  were  a 
great  many  of  them,  but  they  did  not  know  all 
that  was  being  done  in  the  park,  and  it  was  neces- 
sary for  a  man  to  keep  a  sharp  lookout  for  him- 
self if  he  wished  to  escape  uninjured. 

The  date  of  our  departure  the  Ked  Cross  gave  a 


A  Soldier  in  the  ^Philippines.      Id 

fine  dinner  for  all  who  were  going  to  leave  the 
camp.  This  was  the  custom  with  that  society 
when  any  soldiers  left  there  for  the  Philippines. 

All  those  who  left  while  I  was  there  partook 
of  a  splendid  dinner  just  before  leaving. 

This  society,  in  addition  to  the  dinner  given  to 
us,  had  several  hundred  dollars  worth  of  pro- 
visions put  on  board  our  transport,  and  all  marked, 
"For  enlisted  men  only  on  deck." 

At  three  o'clock  in  the  afternoon  of  the  seven- 
teenth day  of  October,  1898,  we  sailed  on  board  the 
transport  "Senator."  The  provisions  put  on 
board  for  us  were  well  cared  for — by  the  officers, 
who  took  charge  of  them  and  guarded  them  so 
well  that  if  an  enlisted  man  got  any  of  them,  he 
had  to  steal  them  from  under  a  guard.  Actually 
had  to  steal  what  belonged  to  him  by  gift,  and  if 
caught  stealing  them  he  was  court  martialed,  and 
fined  enough  to  buy  his  rations  for  a  month,  but 
the  fine  money  was  not  appropriated  in  that  way. 

We  had  a  rough  voyage,  not  on  account  of  the 
weather,  but  because  the  transport  was  so  packed 
and  crowded  that  a  man  did  well  to  walk  from 
one  end  of  the  ship  to  the  other.  We  were  crowded 
like  a  cargo  of  animals  bound  for  a  slaughter  pen. 

A  private  may  think  all  or  anything  he  pleases, 
but  he  does  not  have  an  opportunity  to  say  very 
much  about  anything.  He  must  obey  the  com- 
mands of  his  officers. 

Our  officers  on  the  transport  had  everything  to 
suit  themselves,  and  the  private  had  to  do  the 
best  he  could  and  try  to  be  satisfied,  or  at  least 
appear  that  way. 

It  would  take  two-thirds  of  the  deck  for  half  a 


20      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

dozen  officers  to  have  room.  They  thought  them- 
selves so  superior  to  the  privates  they  did  not  want 
to  be  near  them.  Our  ship  had  fifteen  hundred 
men  on  board. 

We  reached  the  port  of  Honolulu,  after  several 
days'  sailing  on  rough  seas,  October  twenty-fifth; 
^Ye  days  were  taken  to  coal  for  our  long  voyage 
to  Manila.  Honolulu  is  a  fine  city,  about  2,190 
miles  from  San  Francisco.  Located  as  it  is,  away 
out  in  the  Pacific  Ocean,  makes  it  the  more  attrac- 
tive to  a  Georgia  soldier  who  was  on  his  first  sea 
voyage.  There  are  some  fine  views  in  and  around 
Honolulu.  As  our  transport  steamed  into  the 
harbor  of  the  city  I  thought  it  a  grand  sight.  From 
what  I  could  learn  I  had  but  one  objection  to  it 
as  a  desirable  place  to  live — leprosy  is  too  preva- 
lent. A  small  island  is  used  for  the  lepers'  home, 
where  all  who  are  afflicted  with  this  most  loath- 
some of  diseases  are  carried,  yet  the  fact  that 
those  poor  victims  are  in  thai  country  is  a  dis- 
agreeable one  and  makes  one  shudder  to  look  at 
the  island.  No  one  is  allowed  to  go  there,  except 
on  business,  and  they  have  to  get  passes  from 
the  authorities  to  do  so.  I  had  no  desire  to  visit 
the  place. 

Honolulu  is  a  very  good  city,  with  some  of  the 
modern  city  improvements,  such  as  water  works, 
electric  lights,  street  railroads  and  ice  factories. 
These  are  the  results  of  emigration,  people  of  other 
countries  going  in  with  money  and  experience. 
The  natives  are  called  Kanakis.  Agriculture  con- 
sists in  the  cultivation  of  rice,  bananas,  cocoanuts 
and  coffee.  It  was  there  where  I  first  saw  bananas, 
cocoanuts  and  coffee  growing,    A  lieutenant,  with 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      21 

about  twenty-five  men,  including  myself,  went  out 
about  six  miles  along  the  beach.  We  went  to  the 
Diamond  Head,  six  miles  eastward  from  Honolulu. 
This  is  an  old  crater  of  an  extinct  volcano.  Ee- 
turning  to  the  beach  we  went  in  bathing  and  en- 
joyed it  very  much. 

Our  party  had  to  get  passes  and  present  them 
to  guards  on  going  out  and  returning.  Our  trans- 
port having  coaled  and  made  all  the  necessary 
preparations  for  the  voyage  to  Manila,  we  went 
on  board  and  sailed  about  four  o'clock  in  the 
afternoon  of  October  the  thirtieth.  But  few  of 
the  soldiers  had  been  sea-sick  before  arriving  at 
Honolulu,  but  after  leaving  there  many  of  them 
were  ill  for  several  days. 

I  think 'that  the  native  drink  called  swipes  was 
the  cause  of  much  of  it.  This  had  been  very 
freely  imbibed  by  the  soldiers.  It  is  a  peculiar 
beverage,  producing  a  drunkenness  that  lasted 
several  days.  Some  of  the  men  getting  over 
a  drunk  on  this  stuff,  by  taking  a  drink 
of  water  would  again  be  drunk.  I  escaped 
sea-sickness  and,  but  for  the  fact  that  we  were 
living  on  the  transport  like  pigs  in  a  crowded 
pen,  I  would  have  gone  over  comfortably  and 
would  have  enjoyed  the  voyage. 

Our  rations  were  very  poor,  scarcely  fit  for  hogs 
to  eat.  They  consisted  of  a  stewed  stuff  of  beef 
scraps,  called  by  the  men  "slum;''  prunes,  hard 
tack  and  colored  hot  water  for  coffee.  Once  a 
week  we  had  a  change  from  this  of  salmon  or  cod 
fish.  I  believe  those  who  shared  this  food  stuff 
with  me  on  this  voyage  will  bear  me  out  in  the 
statement  that  it  was  tough  fare. 


22      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

The  soldiers  were  not  alone  on  board — ^there 
were  other  passengers  who  seemed  to  dispute  our 
possession  and  waged  war  on  us  both  day  and 
night.  These  belligerents  were  known  as  "gray 
backs/'  some  of  them  being  nearly  one-fourth  of 
an  inch  long  and  very  troublesome.  Clothing 
and  everything  else  seemed  to  be  full  of  them. 

I  have  seen  soldiers  pick  them  off  of  their  bod- 
ies and  clothing  and  kill  them  before  the  men 
went  to  bed,  hoping  to  get  rid  of  them  and  get 
to  sleep. 

I  have  seen  several  times  almost  the  whole  body 
of  soldiers  on  board  sick  and  vomiting.  There 
was  something  peculiar  about  this  sickness.  Never- 
theless, it  was  true;  the  men  were  fed  on  rotten 
prunes  and  fruit,  which,  after  nearly  all  the  supply 
was  consumed,  was  found  by  our  surgeon  to  be 
full  of  worms.  This  had  been  the  cause  of  so 
much  sickness.  By  refusing  to  eat  this  rotten 
stuff  myself  I  was  not  ill. 

About  half  way  between  Honolulu  and  Manila 
an  active  volcano  was  passed  about  four  o'clock 
in  the  morning.  Everybody  went  out  on  deck  to 
see  this  great  sight.  Although  it  was  raining 
at  the  time  the  men  stood  out  in  it  to  see  this 
remarkable  spectacle.  It  had  the  appearance  of 
a  round  hill  sticking  out  of  the  water,  the  whole 
top  burning  and  falling  in. 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      2i 


CHAPTER  IV. 

The  most  interesting  sight  I  ever  beheld  was  in 
the  China  Sea.  One  evening,  just  before  dark, 
when  the  sea  was  rough  and  black,  threatening 
clouds  were  hovering  over  us,  lightning  shooting 
its  fiery  bolts  across  their  path,  and  every  indica- 
tion pointed  to  one  of  those  fearful  typhoons  for 
which  the  China  Sea  is  noted.  The  crew  had 
closed  all  the  port  holes  and  hatchways  prepara- 
tory for  the  storm,  which  was  believed  to  be  fast 
approaching.  While  yet  on  deck  with  a  number 
of  soldiers,  who  were  looking  across  the  surface 
of  the  rough  waters,  there  suddenly  appeared  in 
the  water  an  object  that  looked  like  a  woman;  it 
had  long  hair  just  like  a  woman;  the  upper  part 
of  its  body  was  like  a  woman,  and  to  all  appear- 
ances was  a  woman.  It  rose  about  half  out  of 
the  water  and  sank  back.  Three  times  it  did  this 
and  disappeared.  I  learned  that  this  strange  sea 
animal  was  a  mermaid,  and  that  they  are  seen 
during  such  stormy  weather  as  we  were  then  ex- 
periencing. 

Another  very  interesting  sea  animal  is  the  por- 
poise. It  is  shaped  something  like  a  fish,  except 
the  head,  which  looks  like  that  of  a  hog.  They 
will  follow  a  ship  in  droves,  swimming  near  the 
surface  of  the  water  and  jumping  out  of  the  water 
and  diving  down  like  fish  playing. 


24      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

I  have  seen  many  living  things  in  water,  some 
of  which  were  very  interesting  looking  that  I  never 
heard  any  name  for.  A  very  strange,  helpless- 
looking  object  is  the  star  fish.  They  are  often 
left  by  the  tide  on  the  beach  and  are  perfectly 
helpless  until  another  tide  carries  them  back.  A 
flying  fish  fell  on  deck  of  the  transport  and  was 
picked  up,  greatly  exciting  our  curiosity.  This 
strange  little  animal  never  gets  more  than  a  few 
inches  long.  These  fish  go  in  schools;  sometimes 
a  school  is  so  large  that  it  covers  half  an  acre 
or  more,  skipping  or  flying  along  on  the  surface 
of  the  water  sometimes  one  hundred  yards  before 
striking  the  water  again.  I  had  in  my  hands  the 
one  that  fell  on  our  deck  and  examined  it  with 
a  great  deal  of  curiosity.  It  had  a  pair  of  small 
wings  and  was  very  beautiful. 

The  jelly  fish  does  not  look  very  clean  and 
nice.  The  largest  one  I  ever  saw  was  eighteen 
inches  thick  and  looked  like  a  mass  of  jelly  and 
was  hard  in  the  center.  These  fish  are  of  two 
colors,  white  and  black.  They  can  sting  when 
they  touch  the  naked  body  and  give  as  much  pain 
as  the  sting  of  a  yellow  jacket. 

I  have  been  in  the  water  bathing  and  one  of 
them  would  sting  me,  making  a  great,  red,  burn- 
ing spot.  I  have  seen  sea  serpents,  but  was  never 
close  to  one  where  I  could  see  it  plainly.  They 
seem  to  be  very  easily  frightened,  and  I  only  saw 
them  on  the  surface  of  the  water  at  some  distance. 
They  are  very  large  snakes  with  black  spots. 

The  men  on  our  transport  were  interested  in 
a  flock  of  sea  gulls,  which  to  us  appeared  to  be 
the  same  birds  following  our  vessel  to  pick  up 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      25 

the  scraps  thrown  overboard.  I  could  see  them 
any  day  and  I  therefore  believed  they  were  the 
same  sea  gnlls.  They  can  fly  farther  than  any 
other  bird. 

We  arrived  in  Manila  Bay  November  twenty- 
second,  and  anchored  about  two  miles  out  from 
the  piers  of  the  city.  The  view  was  delightful  to 
all  on  board,  especially  the  soldiers.  We  were 
happy  and  jokes  were  freely  passed  around.  We 
were  once  more  to  be  on  land  and  what  person 
would  not  be  happy  over  this  thought  after  so 
long  a  voyage  over  the  great  waters  of  the  Pacific  ? 

Five  days  we  had  to  wait  before  quarters  could 
be  obtained  and  we  could  land.  I  was  very  anx- 
ious to  get  away  from  that  transport,  which  to  me 
was  worse  than  a  jail.  I  never  was  jailed  in 
my  life,  but  I  believe  that  two  months'  imprison- 
ment would  have  been  more  pleasant  than  the 
time  I  was  on  board  that  ship.  Finally  we  were 
landed  at  a  point  just  below  the  Bridge  of  Spain 
and  marched  into  the  walled  city  of  Manila.  It 
will  be  remembered  that  a  portion  of  the  Twenty- 
third  Eegiment  had  preceeded  us  a  few  months. 
Our  landing  would  reunite  the  regiment,  and  to 
celebrate  the  occasion  that  portion  of  it  that  went 
over  first  had  a  banquet  dinner  prepared  for  our 
arrival.  It  was  a  memorable  occasion  long  to 
be  cherished  by  my  division  of  the  regiment.  Af- 
ter such  disgusting  food  as  we  had  had  since  leav- 
ing San  Francisco  we  appreciated  the  elegant  feast 
and  plenty  of  Manila  wine  that  was  set  before 
us.  This  latter  portion  of  the  regiment  did  full 
justice  to  the  occasion,  both  provisions  and  wine, 
which  was  excellent.    We  stayed  in  the  city  and 


26      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

performed  guard  duty  for  a  few  months.  It  was 
of  the  hardest  sort  all  the  time  that  we  were  in 
the  Philippines.  It  was  performed  day  and  night 
part  of  the  time. 

We  had  "running  guard/*  which  was  day  and 
night,  but  this  would  not  continue  more  than 
a  week  at  one  time.  Manila  was  then  a  dangerous 
place  for  Americans  and  our  guard  and  patrol 
duty  was  desperate  work. 

All  the  citizens  of  Manila  were  our  enemies 
as  long  as  the  Spanish  soldiers  remained  in  the 
city;  when  they  were  sent  back  to  Spain  con- 
ditions improved  immediately. 

No  one  was  permitted  to  go  out  of  the  city. 
The  citizens  were  allowed,  at  intervals  of  several 
days,  to  pass  out  through  the  sally  ports  of  the 
wall  and  take  two  hours'  exercise  in  the  Lunetta, 
which  is  the  favorite  outing  grounds  of  Manila, 
and  a  place  for  executing  insurgents.  This  was 
a  privilege  not  often  granted,  and  when  the  people 
were  thus  indulged  they  had  to  be  back  on  time. 

Aguinaldo,  with  his  army,  was  just  outside 
of  Manila  from  the  time  the  Americans  captured 
it  until  his  attempt  to  enter  and  capture  the  city 
from  the  Americans.  This  attempt  was  made 
on  the  night  of  February  ninth,  the  first  dem- 
onstration indicating  his  intentions  being  made 
about  nine  o'clock  in  the  night.  The  Filipinos 
attempted  to  enter  through  the  sally  ports  and 
were  promptly  discovered  by  the  guards,  who  com- 
manded a  halt.  The  command  was  not  obeyed 
and  the  guards  fired  upon  them.  This  seemed 
to  be  the  signal  for  a  general  engagement  by  the 
Filipinos.     The  Nebrsiska  Volunteers  were  the 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      27 

first  to  receive  the  attack  of  the  enemy.  At  once 
the  battle  became  furious  and  continued  for  sev- 
eral days  and  nights.  The  enemy  was  making  a 
desperate  and  determined  effort  to  enter  the  city, 
but  failed,  and  were  finally  driven  back  to  a  posi- 
tion where  they  could  be  easier  handled  by  our 
forces.  After  about  ten  days^  fighting  the  Ameri- 
cans threw  up  works  and  entrenched  themselves 
and  waited  for  re-enforcements  before  taking  the 
offensive.  The  American  forces  numbered  ten 
thousand  in  the  city  and  the  enemy^s  forces  were 
estimated  at  sixty  thousand.  The  American  lines 
were  getting  too  long  and  weak  to  risk  an  attack 
and  we  held  our  position  and  waited  for  re-en- 
forcements to  arrive.  During  this  time  the  Fili- 
pino prisoners  were  closely  guarded  and  forced 
to  bury  their  dead.  Five  days  were  occupied  in 
this  work  of  picking  up  and  burying  the  dead 
Filipinos.  The  number  of  their  dead  is  unknown, 
but  must  have  been  large.  It  was  reported  that 
five  hundred  Filipinos  were  buried  in  one  day. 
It  was  also  reported  that  eighty  Americans  were 
killed  in  one  night. 

I  shall  never  forget  that  night  attack;  I  was 
one  of  three  men  on  guard  in  the  Spanish  hospital. 
This  was  a  very  dangerous  post  at  any  time,  but 
on  an  occasion  like  that  it  was  more  so.  Three 
hundred  Filipinos  were  in  the  hospital,  about  one 
hundred  prisoners  and  about  sixty  Spanish  women. 
All  the  hospital  corps  of  attendants  were  armed 
with  some  kind  of  weapon,  usually  a  knife.  When 
the  attack  was  made  on  the  guards  at  the  wall 
and  the  firing  commenced,  I  was  sitting  in  a 
chair  and  almost  asleep  from  exhaustion  and  con- 


28      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

tinned  guard  duty.  A  Spanish  woman  in  the 
top  story  of  the  hospital  heard  the  firing.  She 
ran  down  to  where  I  was  sitting,  took  me  by  the 
shoulders  and  was  shaking  me  vigorously  when  I 
first  realized  what  was  taking  place.  She  was 
very  much  excited  and  jabbered  at  me  in  Spanish, 
which  I  had  no  knowledge  of  and  did  not  under- 
stand one  word  she  said.  When  she  saw  that  she 
could  not  make  me  understand  her  Spanish  she 
went  away.  I  heard  the  firing  and  knew  that  an 
attack  was  being  made.  The  Filipinos  in  that 
hospital  would  have  met  with  little  resistance 
from  only  three  guards  had  they  made  a  dash 
for  liberty.  They  could  have  easily  passed  out 
through  the  unlocked  doors  while  we  could  have 
killed  a  few.  After  gaining  the  outside  they 
could  have  given  assistance  to  their  comrades,  and 
in  the  darkness  of  the  night  set  fire  to  the  city 
and  made  our  situation  a  desperate  one  indeed. 
The  Filipinos  knew  the  city  much  better  than  the 
Americans  and  had  Aguinaldo  been  possessed  with 
the  nerve  and  ability  he  could  have  entered,  with 
his  superior  numbers  and  captured  the  city.  The 
Filipinos,  however,  gave  the  Americans  some  hard 
fighting  before  the  enemy's  forces  were  scattered 
over  the  island  of  Luzon.  After  the  Filipinos 
were  scattered  they  divided  into  small  bands,  which 
marched  over  the  island  burning  and  destroying. 
One  of  the  bands  when  run  upon  by  the  Amer- 
icans would  give  them  a  short  desperate  fight  and 
flee  to  the  hills  in  safety.  Frequently  it  happened 
that  a  squad  of  American  soldiers  would  be  out- 
numbered by  a  band  of  the  enemy,  and  it  was 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      29 

then  the  Americans  turned  to  run  into  Manila 
for  safety. 

A  great  many  of  the  native  business  men,  both 
employers  and  employees,  stayed  in  Manila  after 
it  was  captured  and  carried  on  their  business. 
Many  of  these  were  a  menace  to  the  safety  and 
the  authority  of  the  Americans.  All  the  arms 
and  ammunition  and  dynamite  that  could  be  ob- 
tained by  them  were  hidden  away.  They  banded 
together  to  do  all  the  mischief  possible,  but  our 
guards  were  too  clever  for  the  Filipinos  and  al- 
ways detected  their  schemes  and  plots  before  they 
could  be  carried  out.  It  was  believed  that  the 
men  inside  of  the  city  were  working  with  the 
enemy  outside  for  an  outbreak.  Aguinaldo  would 
engage  the  attention  of  the  Americans  and  these 
treacherous  Filipinos  and  Spaniards  inside  would 
do  a  great  deal  of  mischief  before  being  discovered. 

Therefore,  in  the  face  of  all  this,  much  depended 
on  the  efficiency  of  our  guard  duty.  Guards  were 
on  duty  in  all  parts  of  the  city,  in  church  towers 
and  every  place  that  would  give  any  advantage  in 
keeping  a  lookout  for  any  indications  of  trouble. 


30      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 


CHAPTEE  V. 

Before  Aguinaldo's  attempt  to  enter  Manila 
the  friendly  natives  outside  the  city  were  suffer- 
ing from  a  fatal  epidemic  of  some  character,  ap- 
parently so,  judging  by  the  number  of  caskets 
taken  outside.  This  continued  for  several  days; 
one  or  two  caskets  every  day  were  allowed  to  pass 
out  by  the  guards,  although  orders  were  issued 
to  search  all  boxes,  trunks  and  baggage ;  yet  these 
caskets  were  allowed  to  pass  through  unmolested 
for  about  fifteen  days.  Finally  the  guard's  sus- 
picion was  aroused  by  these  frequent  burials  and 
it  was  decided  to  open  a  casket,  which  was  packed 
full  of  Mauser  rifles.  This  ended  the  funerals 
outside.  This  demonstrates  the  trickery  and 
smuggling  schemes  of  these  people. 

I  have  known  prisoners  to  escape  by  exchanging 
clothing  with  their  wives,  who  were  permitted 
to  visit  their  husbands  in  jail,  the  man  passing 
out  and  leaving  the  woman  in  prison.  A  great 
many  prisoners  escaped  in  this  way  before  the 
scheme  was  discovered. 

Dummy  guns  and  soldiers  were  placed  in  forts 
in  a  manner  to  deceive  Americans  as  to  the 
strength  of  the  works,  but  the  Americans  were 
not  to  be  bluffed  so  easily  and  this  scheme  was 
worthless. 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      31 

Almost  the  whole  American  force  was  on  the 
streets  of  Manila  watching  and  expecting  an  at- 
tack for  two  weeks  before  it  was  made.  We  were 
always  prepared  to  fight.  We  had  to  keep  our 
clothes  on  all  the  time  and  our  guns  and  belts 
by  our  side.  I  did  not  have  more  than  fifteen 
nights'  rest  from  the  20th  of  January  to  the  24th 
of  May.  Frequently  we  would  just  get  on  our 
bunk  when  a  call  to  arms  would  be  given;  every 
man  would  rush  out  in  a  hurry  and  sometimes 
had  to  march  four  or  five  miles,  before  stopping, 
through  rain  and  wind,  or  whatever  weather  we 
might  be  called  out  in.  There  we  would  stay 
the  balance  of  the  night.  If  we  wanted  to  lie 
down  we  only  had  one  blanket  to  put  on  the  wet 
ground.  Every  man  had  to  look  out  for  himself 
and  get  the  best  place  he  could. 

We  would  only  be  in  a  few  hours  from  one 
march  until  orders  would  be  received  to  march 
to  some  other  dangerous  point;  it  appeared  that 
we  were  only  marched  back  to  the  city  to  take  a 
bath  and  change  clothing,  which  we  needed. 

I  believe  these  marches  in  the  night  or  day,  in 
the  hot  climate  of  that  country,  lying  on  the  wet 
ground  sometimes  every  night  for  two  weeks,  has 
killed  more  men  than  were  ever  killed  by  the 
Filipinos.  Those  who  never  died  from  the  ex- 
posure died  from  the  kind  of  rations  they  ate 
out  on  the  lines.  It  has  been  a  mystery  to  me 
how  I  ever  reached  America  again.  I  have  been 
through  everything  and  have  seen  as  hard  service 
as  any  soldier  in  the  Philippines,  and  have  eaten 
as  hard  grub  as  any  of  them  ever  ate. 

I  believe  the  Twenty-third  had  call  to  arms 


32      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

no  less  than  twenty-five  times.  Every  time  we 
thought  a  fight  was  on  hand  and  we  would  see 
some  fun  with  the  Filipinos.  Whenever  we  got 
them  started  to  running,  which  most  always  was 
easily  done,  then  the  fun  was  on.  We  were  sent 
out  a  great  many  times  to  guard  some  town  from 
the  enemy's  torch. 

Company  "E,"  of  the  Twenty-third,  was  de- 
tailed to  guard  the  first  reserve  hospital  in  Manila 
and  was  on  duty  ten  days.  The  officers  feared 
that  enough  of  the  enemy  would  slip  through  the 
lines  to  enter  the  hospital  and  commit  many  dep- 
redations and  kill  the  wounded  Americans,  so  we 
were  detailed  to  guard  it  and  walk  the  streets  and 
hold  up  every  vehicle  of  the  Filipinos  and  search 
them  for  arms  and  ammunition.  This  holding 
up  and  searching  gave  the  sentries  all  they  wanted 
to  do.  All  the  time  we  were  there  on  duty  we 
could  not  leave  without  permission.  We  laid 
about  in  the  hot  sun  in  the  day  time  and  at  night 
on  the  ground.  Some  of  the  soldiers  pulled  grass 
and  made  beds  to  sleep  on  on  the  side  of  the 
streets. 

The  only  thing  to  help  pass  the  time  while  on 
this  duty  was  to  go  through  the  hospital  and  look 
at  the  wounded,  some  with  arms  off,  others  with 
a  leg  gone,  while  there  were  men  wounded  in  al- 
most every  imaginable  way  to  be  living.  Some 
would  get  well  when  it  looked  almost  impossible 
for  them  to  recover.  I  have  seen  thirty  to  forty 
wounded  piled  in  a  box  car  and  sent  into  Manila, 
where  they  were  put  on  a  boat  and  carried  up 
the  Pasig  river  to  the  hospital.  They  were  taken 
from  the  boat  and  put  in  a  cold  place  till  the  doc- 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      35 

tor  puts  them  on  the  operating  table  and  han- 
dles them  like  a  butcher  handling  a  beef.  Almost 
every  day  women  and  children  were  brought  in 
with  burned  hands  and  feet,  the  Filipinos  burn- 
ing every  town  which  they  thought  was  about  to 
be  captured,  and  the  women  and  children  suffered ; 
doubtless,  many  were  burned  to  death. 

Fire  is  a  dangerous  resort  of  the  Filipino. 
About  one  hundred  got  through  the  lines  into 
Manila  and  made  an  effort  to  burn  the  city,  but 
the  promptness  of  the  Americans  saved  it,  only 
five  blocks  being  burned.  The  soldiers  were  kept 
busy  guarding  the  negroes  and  keeping  them  away 
from  the  buildings.  Big  stores  were  burning  and 
the  fire  department  was  too  poor  to  save  them; 
the  proprietors  told  the  soldiers  to  go  in  and  get 
anything  they  wanted. 

While  the  fire  department  was  doing  all  it 
could  to  save  the  city  and  sneaking  Filipinos 
were  hindering  the  department  all  they  could 
by  cutting  the  hose.  They  would  assemble  in 
crowds  and  then  the  hose  was  cut;  every  one 
caught  in  this  act  was  shot  down  on  the  spot.  Six 
or  seven  were  thus  punished  that  night.  It  was 
an  exciting  time  and  looked  as  if  Manila  would 
be  burned  in  spite  of  all  our  efforts  to  save  her. 
The  Twenty-third  Regiment  did  guard  duty  all 
night  on  the  west  side  of  the  city.  The  enemy, 
failing  to  burn  Manila,  fired  a  little  bamboo  vil- 
lage outside ;  the  bursting  bamboos  could  be  easily 
heard  by  us.  The  noise  was  just  like  that  of  guns 
and  the  Filipinos  took  advantage  of  this  noise 
to  shoot  at  us  in  the  city.  They  would  get  behind 
the  light  of  the  burning  village  and  when  an  Amer- 


34      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

lean  could  be  seen  in  the  light  of  the  burning 
houses  in  Manila  he  was  shot  at.  This  was  kept 
up  all  night.  Our  great  trouble  was  to  distin^ 
guish  between  the  noise  of  the  bursting  bamboos 
and  the  report  of  a  Mauser  rifle.  The  noise  of 
bursting  bamboos  could  be  heard  three  and  four 
miles,  some  of  them  not  much  unlike  a  six-inch 
gun,  and  the  reports  from  a  burning  bamboo  vil- 
lage was  almost  a  reproduction  of  a  battle  and 
would  last  several  hours. 

After  guarding  the  burning  district  of  the  city 
all  night  we  returned  to  guard  duty  at  the  hospi- 
tal. Orders  were  received  to  march  to  the  firing 
line  at  San  Pedro  Macati.  We  marched  there  on 
the  first  day  of  March  and  stayed  till  the  tenth. 
We  were  in  trenches  at  the  front;  our  provisions 
were  more  than  half  a  mile  at  the  rear  and  details 
were  made  out  each  day  to  bring  up  provisions 
to  the  men  in  the  works.  These  details  were  fired 
at  in  going  and  coming  by  the  Filipinos,  but 
their  fire  was  ineffective,  owing  to  their  distance 
from  us,  until  the  detail  neared  the  trenches,  where 
the  distance  was  not  so  great,  and  it  was  very 
dangerous.     Some  were  wounded. 

A  man  behind  the  works  could  not  get  out  for 
a  few  minutes'  exercise  without  being  fired  at,  and 
if  he  did  not  get  under  cover  soon  they  would 
get  him.  I  have  seen  many  men  shot  that  way; 
they  thought  the  Filipinos  could  not  shoot.  I 
have  seen  some  fine  marksmen  among  them.  They 
could  do  some  good  shooting  until  they  became 
excited  and  fled  for  some  place  of  safety. 

I  have  seen  squads  of  Filipinos  come  near 
iour  trenches  and  open  fire  on  us.    A  squad  of 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      35 

Americans  with  their  arms  would  Jump  out  of  the 
trenches  and  start  towards  them  and  they  would 
soon  disappear  like  so  many  frightened  deer.  I 
was  in  a  squad  of  soldiers  who  ran  three  Fili- 
pinos for  two  miles.  They  were  shot  at  several 
times,  but  got  away. 

We  were  out  ten  days  and  had  two  engagements ; 
we  had  a  very  hard  time  on  this  excursion.  Water 
was  hauled  two  miles  and  a  half  on  a  two-wheeled 
vehicle,  in  old  vessels  holding  four  or  five  gallons. 
By  the  time  we  could  get  to  the  kitchens  about 
half  of  it  would  be  spilled. 

Buffaloes  were  used  like  oxen  in  this  country.  T 
They  were  much  larger,  however,  of  a  dark  brown  '; 
color  and  very  easily  frightened.  When  one  ; 
started  to  run  away  no  man  could  hold  it.  I  have 
seen  them  run  as  fast  as  a  good  horse.  Their  j 
horns  were  of  immense  size  and  flat,  considerably  _! 
extended.  They  generally  did  not  turn  aside  for  | 
smaller  objects  when  running  away.  On  one  oc-  ] 
casion  I  saw  one  run  against  a  stone  building, 
knocking  himself  down.  He  arose  and  ran  on  as 
fast  as  before.  Those  that  run  at  large  will  get 
in  the  water  where  it  will  cover  them  and  stand 
with  their  noses  out  for  half  a  day. 

The  fourth  day  out  at  San  Pedro  Macati  we 
had  a  bush  skirmish  and  some  hard  fighting  for 
about  two  hours. 

This  was  my  first  fighting  and  I  have  to  con- 
fess to  being  a  little  frightened  this  time,  but 
kept  my  nerve  on  all  other  occasions.  We  ran 
them  back  from  the  trenches  and  out  of  sight. 
They  were  not  to  be  seen  even  by  the  aid  of  field 
glasses  any  more  that  day.    We  could  not  estimate 


36      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

the  number  of  killed,  as  they  left  none  on  the 
field. 

The  first  sergeant  of  my  company  was  slightly 
wounded  in  the  chest  by  a  spent  ball,  from  which 
he  recovered  in  a  few  days.  I  was  near  him  and 
heard  the  bullet  strike  him;  it  almost  felled  him. 
This  was  the  first  soldier  I  saw  wounded. 

The  way  the  bullets  were  coming  I  thought 
every  one  of  us  would  be  killed,  but  no  one  was 
shot  except  the  one  just  mentioned.  Out-posts 
were  always  stationed  two  hundred  yards  or  more 
from  camp  every  night,  or  in  front  of  our  trenches, 
to  prevent  a  night  attack.  If  the  enemy  started 
through  our  picket  lines  they  were  fired  on  by 
the  pickets,  who  would  then  rapidly  fall  back  to 
our  lines  of  trenches.  This  out-post  duty  is  very 
important  and  very  dangerous,  especially  when 
the  sneaking  Filipinos  were  in  the  community. 

Many  nights  the  Americans  would  be  aroused 
from  their  slumbers  by  the  enemy's  attacks  and 
efforts  to  surprise  them,  and  we  would  lie  in  our 
trenches  and  fire  on  them  till  they  left.  The 
enemy  would  be  stationed  on  an  opposite  hill  and 
they  would  sometimes  get  very  close  to  our  out- 
posts, who  could  see  them  moving  about  and  talk- 
ing and  hear  them  walking  in  the  leaves  and  un- 
derbrush. Our  sentinels  had  orders  not  to  fire 
on  them  unless  they  made  an  attack,  when  the 
sentinels  fired  and  got  back  into  the  trenches  as 
quickly  as  possible  to  escape  being  killed  by  our 
own  men. 

They  violated  the  custom  of  the  white  flag  fre- 
quently. A  party  of  six  or  eight  would  leave 
their  lines  with  a  white  flag  and  advance  a  little 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      37 

and  wave  the  flag.  A  party  of  Americans  would 
start  to  meet  them. 

Every  time  the  Americans  stopped  the  Fili- 
pinos stopped.  They  tried  to  get  our  men  as  near 
them  as  possible  and  when  they  thought  they  could 
get  our  men  no  nearer  they  would  seize  their 
rifles,  which  they  would  have  concealed  behind 
them,  and  fire  on  our  soldiers.  Their  scheme 
evidently  was  to  kill  all  the  officers  they  could, 
but  they  only  succeeded  in  killing  two,  as  far  as 
came  to  my  knowledge.  After  a  few  attempts 
of  this  kind  they  were  fired  on  regardless  of  their 
white  flag  scheme. 

While  at  San  Pedro  Macati  the  First  Colorado 
Volunteers  would  go  out  and  sleep  all  night  on 
the  hill-top.  Some  one  was  killed,  or  wounded, 
every  night  this  was  done.  But  few  Americans 
were  killed  before  the  advance  was  made  on  the 
enemy.  A  strong  post  was  taken  and  many  Fil- 
ipinos killed  and  captured.  Ninety  were  captured 
in  one  little  bamboo  village  of  a  dozen  houses. 
This  was  the  morning  of  March  tenth.  That 
evening  orders  were  received  to  return  to  Manila. 
We  had  been  in  the  trenches  the  greater  part  of 
the  ten  days  at  San  Pedro  Macati,  and  had  two 
engagements,  one  the  fourth  and  one  the  tenth 
of  March. 

We  set  out  on  the  return  to  Manila  late  in  the 
evening  of  March  tenth.  We  had  a  march  of  six 
miles  to  make.  A  heavy  rain  drenched  the  sol- 
diers, reaching  the  walled  city  of  Manila  about 
eleven  o'clock  that  night. 

After  a  few  days'  rest  Company  "E"  of  the 
Twenty-third  went  up  the  Pasig  river  on  cascos 


38      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

to  Laguna  de  Bay,  a  distance  of  fifty  miles  from 
Manila.  This  is  a  body  of  fresh  water  twenty 
miles  wide  and  sixty  miles  long,  and  deep  enough 
to  float  a  large  steamer. 

A  gun  boat,  which  stayed  there  in  the  bay,  and 
of  the  same  name,  was  boarded  by  a  part  of  our 
soldiers  and  steamed  up  the  bay  for  the  purpose 
of  capturing  Santa  Cruz.  We  had  to  go  up  in 
front  of  the  town  in  full  view  of  the  Filipinos, 
who  saw  the  approach  of  the  gun  boat  and  left 
in  haste  for  the  mountains. 

Our  boat  grounded  and  we  had  to  wade  out  a 
distance  of  two  hundred  yards.  The  bottom  of 
the  lake  was  uneven  and  by  the  time  land  was 
reached  we  were  wet  from  running  into  holes  if 
deep  water.  On  reaching  land  a  line  of  skirmish- 
ers was  formed  and  the  town  was  entered  without 
any  trouble.  But  one  Filipino  was  seen.  He 
was  almost  frightened  to  death.  With  the  aid 
of  field  glasses  we  could  see  Filipinos  on  the 
mountains.  When  we  left  they  returned,  but  be- 
fore going  we  burned  some  large  buildings  in 
which  supplies  were  stored,  mostly  rice  and  sugar. 
We  returned  to  the  gunboat  and  cascos  late  that 
evening. 

Captain  Grant,  of  the  gunboat,  wanted  to  go 
about  thirty  miles  up  the  bay  from  Santa  Cruz. 
We  made  the  run  in  three  hours.  It  was  a  very 
bright  moonlight  night.  The  objective  point  was 
reached  about  eight  o'clock.  On  getting  very 
close  to  shore  an  old  priest  was  seen  on  the  dock 
waving  a  big  white  flag,  which  he  continued  to 
wave  until  we  landed.  Captain  Pratt  took  an 
interpreter  with  him  and  learned  from  the  old 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      39 

man  that  everything  there  was  all  right.  He 
informed  Captain  Pratt  that  he  thought  the  town 
would  be  bombarded  if  not  surrendered  without 
it.  There  was  a  fine  church  at  this  place;  the 
town  was  built  of  bamboo.  A  few  stores  and 
about  four  hundred  Filipinos  were  there.  The 
Filipinos  had  gone  to  the  mountains  while  we 
were  landing,  but  returned  when  the  old  priest 
rang  the  church  bell  as  a  signal  that  all  was 
well.  We  were  preparing  to  sleep  in  their  bam- 
boo houses,  but  Captain  Pratt,  fearing  some 
treachery,  ordered  us  to  the  cascos  and  gunboat 
to  sleep,  but  as  we  were  wet  and  muddy  large 
camp  fires  were  built  where  we  could  dry  and 
eat  our  salmon  and  hard  tack  before  going  on  the 
boats. 

We  had  had  some  hard  service  for  four  days 
and  felt  very  much  like  sleeping,  but  the  boats 
rolled  and  plunged  until  we  could  not  sleep.  We 
were  in  a  dangerous  place.  Had  all  the  Filipinos 
who  came  into  that  place  that  night  been  around 
they  could  have  given  us  a  hard  fight,  and  possi- 
bly have  killed  us,  but,  fortunately,  they  did  not 
appear  to  have  any  arms.  Next  morning  two 
cascos  were  loaded  with  captured  wood  and  we 
left  this  place  to  go  down  and  across  the  lake  to 
take  another  town. 

Our  boats  were  anchored  two  miles  out  and  an 
armed  detail  sent  out  in  a  small  launch  to  recon- 
noitre. It  was  found  to  be  too  strong  for  our 
forces.  A  strong  fort  and  almost  three  thousand 
Filipinos  were  in  the  town.  We  remained  in 
front  of  this  place  until  the  next  morning  watch- 
ing for  Aguinaldo^s  gunboats.     He  had  four  in 


40      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

the  bay.  One  had  been  captured.  Just  before 
dark  one  of  these  gunboats  was  sighted  coming 
around  the  point  of  an  island.  It  was  going  into 
port,  but  seeing  our  boats  it  turned  back.  We 
made  no  effort  to  pursue  this  vessel,  as  our  boat 
was  slow  of  speed  and  night  was  coming  on. 
Nothing  more  was  seen  during  the  night  and 
next  morning  we  went  down  the  lake  to  the  Pasig 
river,  which  is  the  lake's  outlet.  Going  down  the 
river  about  five  miles  we  awaited  orders  from 
Manila. 

We  were  out  on  this  expedition  for  ten  days, 
part  of  this  time  on  the  Laguna  de  Bay  and  the 
remainder  in  the  Pasig  river. 

We  had  a  good  time  after  starting  back  towards 
Manila,  but  little  to  do  and  less  to  care  for.  While 
awaiting  orders  on  the  river  we  consumed  a  great 
deal  of  time  hunting  chickens  and  ducks.  These 
were  very  plentiful  and  easily  caught.  We  fared 
well  on  these  every  day  for  a  week.  We  also  killed 
all  the  hogs  that  were  necessary  to  supply  our 
wants,  and  there  were  plenty  of  them.  The  first 
ones  were  killed  by  Lieutenant  Franklin,  who 
took  a  rifle  out  one  evening  and  was  gone  almost 
an  hour.  At  last  he  returned  with  two  fat  pigs 
which  he  had  shot.  We  expected  to  enjoy  eating 
them  the  next  morning  as  they  had  to  be  dressed 
and  cooked.  Next  morning  our  hopes  and  ex- 
pectations of  a  good  meal  were  exploded  by  finding 
that  the  pigs  were  spoiled.  After  that  we  profited 
by  that  experience  and  always  ate  our  hogs  as 
soon  as  they  could  be  prepared.  The  trouble  about 
keeping  fresh  meat  there  was  the  hot;  moist  cli- 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      41 

mate.    This  would  soon  spoil  it,  especially  if  not 
dressed  immediately  after  being  killed. 

On  the  ninth  day  of  this  expedition  about 
twenty-five  men  went  out  on  a  hunt  for  porkers. 
Six  very  good-sized  ones  were  secured  by  this' 
party,  to  which  I  belonged.  Another  expedition 
went  duck  hunting  and  bagged  eighty  fine 
ones.  Great  numbers  of  chickens  were  every- 
where in  the  woods  and  towns.  They  belonged 
to  the  natives.  A  party  of  soldiers  caught  fifteen 
of  these  while  the  hogs  and  ducks  were  being 
secured.  These  three  parties  returned  about  the 
same  time  loaded  with  the  spoils  of  the  chase. 

The  cooks  tried  to  please  every  one  and  set  us 
at  dressing  our  game.  They  cooked  every  hog, 
chicken  and  duck  for  dinner  that  day.  There 
were  about  ninety  men  in  this  company.  This 
was  one  of  the  last  three  days  out  on  this  expedi- 
tion of  ten  days.  The  other  seven  were  very 
rough  and  hard  ones  for  us. 

One  night  some  of  the  men  made  a  new  ar- 
rangement about  sleeping.  The  day  had  been  hot 
and  clear  and  the  open  air  was  desirable  to  sleep 
in  where  we  could  enjoy  the  full  benefit  of  a  nice 
cool  breeze  which  was  blowing.  The  deck  of  the 
gunboat  we  thought  an  ideal  place  to  spend  the 
night.  We  were  very  sleepy.  This  spot  was  free 
from  mosquitoes  and  we  were  preparing  for  a  fine 
rest.  Captain  Grant  looked  out  on  deck  at  our 
positions  and  said :  "Boys,  look  out  up  there  to- 
night. It  rains  here  in  this  country  sometimes.'^ 
The  sky  was  almost  cloudless  and  we  thought 
nothing  of  rain. 

About  two  o'clock  I  awoke,  thoroughly  drenched, 


42      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines/ 

and  the  rain  falling  as  fast  as  I  ever  saw  it  in 
my  life.  Any  one  who  has  not  seen  it  rain  in  a 
hot  country  has  an  inadequate  idea  how  hard  a 
tropical  rain  really  is.  My  blanket  was  perfectly 
wet  and  the  water  was  standing  on  one  side  of  me 
in  a  pool.  It  took  me  so  by  surprise  that  I  was 
bewildered.  Finally  I  decided  to  leave  that  place 
and  seek  shelter.  I  wrung  the  water  out  of  my 
blanket  and  groped  about  in  the  inky  darkness  and 
went  into  the  engine  room,  where  I  stayed  until 
morning.  That  drenching  rain  seemed  to  affect 
all  who  were  exposed  to  it  and  resulted  in  severe 
colds  in  every  instance.  The  twenty-fourth  of 
March  we  were  about  fifteen  miles  from  Manila, 
up  the  Pasig  river,  awaiting  orders.  The  Pasig 
river  is  deep  and  wide,  large  steamers  being  able 
to  traverse  its  waters.  A  strong  under  current 
made  swimming  difficult  and  dangerous. 

Observing  some  soldiers  across  the  river  at  a 
deserted  bamboo  village  I  decided  to  go  over  to 
them.  I  set  out  and  swam  till  tired.  Looking 
back  I  discovered  that  I  was  about  half  way 
across  the  river.  I  swam  until  I  was  almost  too 
exhausted  to  raise  one  hand  above  the  other.  I 
could  not  tell  whether  I  was  moving  or  not,  ex- 
cept, perhaps,  down  stream. 

I  was  in  a  critical  condition,  but  did  not  give 
up  nor  get  excited.  Had  I  done  so  I  believe  that 
I  would  have  drowned.  I  know  of  about  twenty 
soldiers  who  were  drowned  while  trying  to  swim 
across  the  Pasig  river. 

By  struggling  with  all  my  strength  I  succeeded 
in  getting  across.  I  did  not  know  how  I  could 
get  back  without  swimming  and  I  decided  not 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      43 

to  try  that.  I  was  very  exhausted  and  rested 
and  planned  a  long  time.  Finally  I  found  a  piece 
of  plank  and  getting  on  that  I  went  across  all 
right.  This  experience  was  sufficient  for  me,  and 
after  that  I  never  went  into  water  too  deep  to 
wade. 

We  left  our  river  post  and  went  into  Manila. 
On  the  way  down  the  river  we  met  with  an  acci- 
dent that  might  have  been  fatal  to  about  fifty 
men.  A  casco  had  been  captured  in  the  Laguna  de 
Bay,  and  about  fifty  men,  including  myself,  went 
on  board  the  captured  vessel  and  were  being  towed 
into  Manila  by  a  launch.  Our  vessels  had  to  pass 
under  the  Bridge  of  Spain.  The  captured  boat 
was  too  high  and  in  attempting  to  pass  under 
the  bridge  the  whole  top  of  the  casco  was  torn 
off,  timbers  and  fragments  of  the  broken  vessel 
were  flying  in  every  direction,  and  it  looked  as  if 
the  men  could  not  escape  these  missiles.  I  was 
in  the  stern  and  thought  that  half  of  the  men 
on  deck  would  be  knocked  out  into  the  water  and 
possibly  drowned.  Quicker  than  it  takes  to -tell 
it,  I  was  lying  on  my  back  in  a  close,  narrow 
place  where  there  was  just  enough  room  for  me 
to  wedge  into.  The  casco  was  being  pulled  to 
pieces  against  the  bridge  and  as  it  went  farther 
under  the  bridge  the  rudder  beam  was  pushed 
around  over  me  with  such  force  that  it  left  grooves 
in  a  piece  of  timber  not  more  than  an  inch  above 
my  face.  It  was  that  piece  of  timber  that  saved 
me  from  being  crushed  to  death. 

After  the  excitement  had  subsided  a  little  I 
found  that  I  had  been  struck  on  one  side  and 
hurt,  but  only  slightly.     The  launch  tore  loose 


44      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

from  the  casco  and  before  it  could  again  be  fast- 
ened another  accident  threatened  us.  Several 
large  sailing  vessels  lay  at  anchor  along  the  river 
and  the  casco  was  about  to  run  into  them.  This 
accident  was  avoided  and  we  were  landed  and 
marched  into  the  walled  city  of  Manila. 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      45 


CHAPTER  VI. 

Our  company  arrived  at  Manila  on  the  night  of 
March  24,  1899.  The  next  night  our  regiment 
was  ordered  out  to  re-enforce  the  volunteers  in 
capturing  Malabon.  This  town  was  full  of  Fil- 
ipinos, who  were  fighting  the  volunteer  forces 
then  trying  to  capture  the  town.  Our  forces 
marched  to  the  north  of  the  town  and  camped. 
Every  soldier  had  to  cook  his  own  provisions,  if 
he  ate  any  that  were  cooked.  The  march  from 
Manila  to  our  camp  was  twelve  miles.  Every 
man  carried  one  hundred  rounds  of  cartridges, 
knapsack  and  his  provisions.  The  site  of  our 
camp  was  on  the  bank  of  the  Malabon  river,  which 
was  reached  at  sunset.  We  had  to  cross  the  river 
before  camping  and  the  only  chance  was  to  wade 
or  swim.  Some  could  wade,  but  those  who  were 
short  had  to  swim.  We  wanted  to  cross  without 
getting  our  blankets  and  provisions  wet,  but  some 
were  more  unfortunate  and  lost  them.  I  tied  my 
blanket  and  provisions  to  the  bayonet  fixed  on 
my  rifle  and  crossed  with  them  dry,  but  my  person 
suffered  by  the  water  and  mud.  Night  had  come 
on  by  the  time  the  regiment  reached  the  camping 
side  of  the  river  and  guards  had  to  be  put  on 
duty  at  once.  Our  blankets  were  piled  up  for 
no  further  service  while  we  were  out  on  this  e^^- 


46      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

pedition;  the  men,  wet  and  muddy,  had  to  pass 
the  night  the  best  they  could.  There  were  sup- 
posed to  be  from  3,000  to  4,000  Filipinos  near 
by  and  our  night  camp  was  a  hazardous  one. 
Everything  must  be  done  with  the  utmost  caution. 
The  men,  wet  and  muddy,  fought  mosquitoes 
all  night  and  had  no  rest.  The  Filipinos  could  be 
heard  all  night  busily  tearing  up  the  railroad 
track  and  destroying  a  bridge  a  few  hundred  yards 
from  us.  They  dug  pits  in  the  ground  and  built 
fires  in  them,  over  which  the  track  rails  were 
placed  till  hot  enough  to  easily  bend.  Bending 
the  rails,  they  thought,  prevented  the  Americans 
from  using  them  again  in  shipping  supplies  over 
the  road.  The  site  of  our  camp  was  a  low,  mucky 
place  on  the  river  bank,  where  mosquitoes  literally 
filled  the  air. 

That  was  the  hardest  night  on  me  of  all  the 
nights  of  two  years'  service  in  the  Philippine  Isl- 
ands. I  was  so  sleepy  and  tired  next  morning 
that  I  could  scarcely  hold  up  my  head,  and  my 
condition  seemed  to  be  no  worse  than  that  of 
every  other  soldier  in  the  regiment.  Mosquitoes 
had  bitten  me  through  my  trousers  and  brought 
blood.  Frequently  I  have  been  sleeping  after  a 
hard  day's  service  when  the  mosquitoes  would  bite 
my  face  and  the  blood  run  out  and  dry  up  in  hard 
drops.  When  I  could  not  get  water  to  wash  off 
these  places  I  would  scratch  them  off.  In  some 
cases  these  bites  were  poisonous.  I  have  seen 
soldiers  with  large  sores,  caused  by  scratching 
mosquito  bites.  I  was  cautious  about  poisoning 
during  my  service  in  the  Philippines. 
\J      The  morning  of  the  36th,  about  four  o'clock, 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      47 

I  saw  from  my  post,  where  I  had  been  all  night, 
a  big  fire  in  the  direction  of  Malabon.  The  Fili- 
pinos had  fired  the  town  and  left  it.  It  was  our 
purpose  to  capture  the  place  and  take  some  forts 
on  the  river,  but  the  tricky  Filipinos  preferred 
burning  their  town  to  surrendering  it  to  the  hated 
Americans. 

Our  forces  took  up  the  advance  on  the  enemy, 
who  stubbornly  resisted  us  from  ten  o'clock  in 
the  morning  until  four  in  the  evening,  when  they 
retired  to  Malinto  and  took  another  stand  behind 
a  stone  wall  and  held  this  position  until  driven 
from  it  by  a  charge.  We  had  to  advance  up  a 
long  slope  of  open  ground  for  one  and  a  half 
miles.  Firing  was  kept  up  rapidly  all  the  way. 
The  enemy  was  driven  out  and  the  town  taken. 
About  thirty  men  were  killed  and  wounded  on 
the  American  side.  The  enemy's  loss  was  not 
known,  but  must  have  been  very  heavy. 

One  poor  fellow  who  was  among  the  wounded 
in  this  battle  I  remember  very  distinctly.  He 
was  first  sergeant  of  Company  G,  Twenty-second 
Eegiment.  He  was  shot  through  the  head.  The 
doctor  dressing  the  wounds  as  he  came  to  the 
wounded  saw  this  sergeant  and  said  there  was 
no  use  to  do  anything  for  him,  that  he  would  die 
in  a  few  minutes.  The  wounded  man  replied  that 
he  would  live  longer  than  the  doctor  would  and 
wanted  his  wounds  dressed.  He  lay  there  and 
talked  to  his  comrades,  who  were  around  him, 
and  cursed  the  doctor  for  neglecting  him.  He 
remained  in  this  condition  an  hour  or  two  and 
died. 

After  a  short  rest  in  Malinto  we  marched  about 


48      A  Soldier  in  the  Pliilippines. 

one  mile  south  and  back  to  Malinto  again.  That 
night  we  marched  to  a  point  near  a  station  on  the 
Manita  and  Dagupan  Eailroad  and  camped.  We 
were  then  about  eight  miles  from  Manila,  and 
opposite  Malabon,  which  is  off  the  railroad  and 
on  the  beach  near  the  mouth  of  the  Malabon  river. 
Our  camp  was  located  more  than  two  miles  from 
where  we  had  left  our  blankets  that  morning  on 
going  into  battle.  A  detail  of  ten  men,  including 
myself,  was  made  out  to  go  after  the  blankets. 
They  were  obtained  and  we  returned  to  camp  with 
them  about  ten  o'clock  that  night.  We  had  to 
cook  our  rations  for  supper  after  our  return,  but 
being  rather  a  frugal  meal  of  easy  preparation 
but  little  time  was  required  to  prepare  it;  frying 
some  bacon  in  mess  kits  composed  all  the  cooking ; 
hard  tack  and  canned  tomatoes  composed  the  re- 
mainder of  the  meal.  The  ground  with  the  starry 
heavens  overhead  and  one  blanket  was  both  house 
and  bed.  The  next  day  we  marched  into  Manila, 
arriving  about  twelve  o'clock.  We  remained  there 
doing  guard  duty  till  the  30th  day  of  March. 

In  the  evening  of  the  29th  orders  were  read 
out  to  provide  three  days'  rations,  fill  our  can- 
teens and  each  man  to  be  furnished  with  one 
hundred  and  fifty  cartridges.  We  all  expected 
a  battle  and  were  anxious  for  it,  but  did  not  know 
where  we  were  most  likely  to  get  it.  Every  one 
was  bnsy  and  anxious  to  be  marching,  especially 
t>>e  oflRcers,  who  usually  could  hardly  wait  for 
th<^  ^-ime  to  come  after  receiving  orders  to  march. 

Wp  were  to  have  supper  on  this  occasion  at  five 
o'clock,  but  all  we  had  were  some  scraps  and 
crumbs  from  the  camp  kitchen. 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      49 

Our  orders  were  to  march  to  Maricana,  which 
was  held  by  the  enemy.  We  marched  twelve  miles 
before  camping.  It  rained  before  we  started  out 
from  Manila  and  cleared  up,  but  left  the  roads 
very  muddy  and  made  marching  very  hard.  The 
twelve  miles  were  made  by  ten  o'clock.  That  night 
the  wet  ground  served  as  couch  and  one  blanket 
as  all  the  covering.  We  had  to  recline,  if  we  lay 
down  at  all,  with  gun  and  belt  at  our  side,  ready 
at  a  moment's  notice  to  meet  the  enemy's  attack 
should  they  swoop  down  upon  us  in  camp.  After 
a  halt  of  six  hours  we  set  about  at  four  o'clock 
preparing  breakfast,  every  man  cooking  his  own 
rations  in  camp  kit  and  making  coffee  in  a  quart 
cup. 

Men  were  gathered  around  their  little  fires  of 
wet  wood  on  the  damp  ground  trying  to  burn  wet 
wood  and  cook  over  the  little  fire  it  made.  Some 
of  the  hungry  men  had  just  succeeded  in  getting 
their  fires  to  burn  and  commenced  to  cook  when 
orders  were  given  to  prepare  for  the  march  to 
Maricana,  which  we  were  expected  to  capture  that 
day  and  to  take  the  Filipinos  prisoners  or  drive 
them  into  the  neighboring  mountains.  It  is  need- 
less to  say  that  those  men  who  failed  to  get  their 
breakfast  were  ready  to  fight.  They  had  an  op- 
portunity before  many  hours  passed. 

From  the  camp  it  was  five  miles  to  Maricana. 
The  march  began  at  four-thirty,  while  it  was 
still  dark,  and  we  could  move  unseen  by  any  of 
the  enemy  who  chanced  to  be  lurking  in  our  vicin- 
ity. We  marched  through  the  woods  and  without 
speaking  above  a  whisper  marched  close  to  the 
enemy  before  we  were  discovered.    Their  sentinels 


50      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

in  the  church  towers  were  the  first  to  discover 
our  approach  and  give  the  alarm  by  ringing  the 
bells. 

Maricana  is  located  on  the  bank  of  a  river  and 
we  advanced  within  one  hundred  and  fifty  yards 
of  the  opposite  bank  before  we  were  discovered. 
We  advanced  at  double  time  and  reached  the 
river  bank,  when  we  lay  down  and  opened  fire 
just  as  the  early  daylight  was  appearing.  Our 
skirmish  line  covered  the  whole  town,  in  which 
the  enemy  were  stationed  as  a  reserve  force  to 
their  advanced  lines  along  the  river.  This  ad- 
vance, or  outer  line  of  the  enemy,  were  fortified 
behind  a  stone  wall.  Our  line  was  at  the  dis- 
advantage of  being  in  the  open  ground.  The  lines 
thus  formed  were  hotly  engaged  for  some  time 
when  the  command  was  given  to  cross  the  river 
and  charge  the  enemy's  lines.  The  river  bank 
in  front  of  me  was  about  ten  feet  high,  but  this 
offered  no  obstacle  to  me  when  bullets  were  falling 
thick  and  fast  near  by.  At  the  command  to  cross 
I  jumped  and  somehow  got  down  the  bank  and 
into  the  water.  Looking  back  I  saw  no  one  else 
coming.  The  bullets  were  coming  around  me  so 
fast  I  had  no  time  to  form  any  plans  and  I  pushed 
on  into  the  water  until  it  was  almost  over  my 
head.  I  remained  in  this  condition  until  I  saw 
my  command  crossing  about  one  hundred  yards 
below  me.  I  could  not  get  out  on  the  bank  to 
go  down  and  decided  I  would  wade  down  to  the 
crossing  place  and  join  our  forces  there.  I  was 
almost  exhausted  when  I  reached  the  shore.  The 
enemy,  seeing  our  intentions  to  attack  their  line, 
remained  behind  the  stone  wall  and  fired  at  ua 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      51 

until  we  were  nearly  across.  Then  they  could  stay 
there  no  longer  and  fled  from  their  strong  posi- 
tion. We  crossed  and  entered  the  town,  capturing 
five  armed  men.  The  enemy  beat  a  hasty  retreat, 
rather  a  pell-mell  flight  across  the  open  country 
towards  the  mountains,  at  whose  bay  they  had 
entrenchments  and  a  large  reserve  force.  The 
fight  lasted  from  daylight  till  about  two  o'clock  in 
the  evening.  The  battle  of  Maricana  was  as  hard 
as  any  fought  in  the  Philippine  Islands.  About 
three  thousand  American  soldiers  were  engaged. 
Several  were  killed  and  a  great  many  of  the 
Filipinos. 

When  an  American  was  wounded  his  wound 
was  dressed  and  some  soldier's  blue  shirt  hung 
up  near  him  to  designate  the  place  where  a 
wounded  American  was.  In  this  way  no  one 
would  be  left  on  the  field  after  the  battle  when 
the  dead  and  wounded  were  picked  up. 

The  Filipinos  were  not  so  well  cared  for.  I 
saw  a  great  many  soldiers  run  out  of  their  way 
in  order  to  step  on  a  dead  or  wounded  Fili- 
pino. They  would  shout  with  joy  at  their  punish- 
ment of  the  poor  Filipino. 

I  was  near  three  Americans  who  were  shot  that 
day;  two  of  them  were  killed.  The  one  who  re- 
covered was  a  member  of  my  company.  A  ball 
passed  through  his  body,  entering  the  back  and 
passing  out  on  the  right  side.  It  didn't  seem 
possible  for  him  to  live,  but  in  one  month  he  was 
again  at  his  post  of  duty.  A  lieutenant  of  the 
Fourth  Infantry  had  his  horse  killed  under  him. 
Jumping  off  he  took  out  his  field  glasses  and  got 
on  his  knees  and  began  looking  for  sharpshooters. 


52      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

In  less  than  a  minute  he  was  shot  through  the 
heart  and  fell  dead  without  speaking.  I  thought 
every  second  I  would  get  a  bullet,  for  they  were 
flying  so  thick  and  close  that  I  did  not  see  how  I 
could  escape  them.  Before  the  battle  was  over 
I  wished  I  might  be  shot,  for  I  never  was  so  nearly 
dead  in  all  my  life.  My  condition  did  not  appear 
to  be  any  worse  than  that  of  every  other  Ameri- 
can soldier. 

We  were  run  almost  to  exhaustion  and  were 
awfully  hot.  I  drank  water  that  day  from  ditches 
and  holes  when  the  water  looked  green  and  tasted 
very  badly.  I  knew  the  water  was  filthy  and  even 
dangerous  to  drink,  but  I  was  not  going  to  die 
for  water  when  there  was  plency  of  it  near  by. 
During  the  heat  of  the  battle  I  was  lying  down 
near  an  old  soldier.  We  were  both  trying  to 
get  cover.  We  were  fighting  hard  with  no  pro- 
tection but  the  ridges  in  a  large  rice  field  which 
we  were  fighting  over.  Our  firing  line  was  in  a 
line  of  skirmishers.  A  bullet  hit  the  ground  in 
front  and  between  the  old  soldier  and  where  I 
lay.  It  knocked  dirt  in  our  faces.  The  old  sol- 
dier looked  at  me  and  appeared  to  be  very  much 
frightened.  I  only  laughed  at  his  funny  looks. 
Before  I  got  away  from  that  position  I  felt  a 
hard  shock  on  my  chest.  I  thought  that  I  was 
shot  at  last  and  put  my  hand  up  to  examine  the 
wound.  Finding  myself  all  right  I  looked  at  the 
ridge  and  saw  what  it  all  meant.  A  bullet  was 
buried  in  the  ridge.  I  dug  it  out  with  my  bay- 
onet and  kept  it,  and  I  have  it  yet  as  a  souvenir 
of  that  day's  battle.    I  have  several  more  bullets 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      53 

which  struck  near  me  at  different  times  and 
places.  All  of  these  I  treasure,  for  I  do  not 
expect  to  get  any  more  bullets  just  as  I  did  these. 
The  American  loss  at  Maricana  was  twenty- 
four  killed  and  nineteen  wounded. 


54      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 


CHAPTER  VII. 

After  leaving  the  battlefield  we  returned  to  the 
camp  we  had  left  that  morning.  The  whole  force 
was  almost  exhausted  by  the  day's  service  and 
marching  was  a  slow,  burdensome  task.  A  great 
many  men  lost  their  provisions  in  the  battle  or 
in  crossing  the  river.  Mine  was  lost  in  the  river 
together  with  my  mess  kit,  canteen  and  haversack. 
Those  who  were  fortunate  enough  not  to  lose  their 
rations  of  canned  beef  and  hard  tack  were  enjoy- 
ing a  hasty  meal.  At  this  juncture  orders  from 
Manila  were  to  march  to  Caloocan  Church  that 
night,  a  distance  of  about  twenty-three  miles.  It 
was  then  getting  late  in  the  evening  and  this  march 
to  be  rnade  before  camping  was  not  very  pleas- 
ant news  to  already  footsore  and  tired  soldiers. 
Before  marching  out  of  sight  of  our  camp  men 
began  falling  out.  I  marched  about  half  an  hour 
and  had  to  fall  out  of  ranks  and  straggle  along 
as  best  I  could.  My  company  set  out  for  Caloocan 
with  one  hundred  and  twenty-eight  men,  only 
eighteen  of  whom  marched  through  that  night. 
The  others  were  scattered  along  the  route,  footsore 
and  worn  out.  Many  of  them  pulled  off  their 
shoes  to  relieve  their  blistered  feet  and  marched 
barefooted  and  carried  their  shoes  in  their  hands, 
and,  like  myself,  stopping  almost  every  hundred 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      55 

yards  to  rest  a  few  minutes.  We  were  afraid  to 
stop  long  at  a  time.  We  would  have  become  too 
sore  and  stiff  to  move. 

We  continued  to  move  along  in  this  tedious, 
toilsome  way  as  rapidly  as  possible.  My  party 
of  three  were  proceeding  as  best  we  could.  In 
the  darkness  of  the  night  we  lost  our  way  by  tak- 
ing the  wrong  road  and  went  into  a  small  town, 
where  we  found  a  few  white  men,  one  of  them 
a  doctor  belonging  to  the  First  Eegiment  of  Col- 
orado Volunteers.  He  made  many  inquiries  about 
us  and  our  regiment  and  asked  all  about  the  bat- 
tle fought  that  day.  He  looked  after  our  welfare 
by  providing  us  with  shelter  and  beds,  but  there 
was  something  else  we  wanted  before  sleeping. 
We  were  perishing  for  food  and  all  we  had  be- 
tween us  was  a  small  can  of  bacon,  a  ten  cent 
United  States  coin  and  one  small  Spanish  coin 
(a  paseado).  With  these  we  went  out  to  buy 
bread.  We  found  a  Chinaman  and  bought  a  piece 
of  bread  that  was  so  hard  we  could  scarcely  eat 
it,  but  we  made  a  very  good  meal  on  that  and  the 
bacon. 

We  slept  on  a  good  spring  bed  and  I  awoke  next 
morning  in  the  position  I  was  in  when  I  fell 
asleep.  I  was  so  stiff  and  sore  that  it  was  miser- 
able to  have  to  move.  After  breakfast  we  went 
into  Manila  and  took  the  railroad  for  our  com- 
mand. 

A  number  of  soldiers  arrived  after  we  did  and 
reported  for  duty.  All  the  provisions  that  I  ate 
on  this  expedition,  which  lasted  three  days,  would 
not  have  made  more  than  one  good  meal.  Before 
my  party  reported  at  Caloocan  one  of  the  other 


56      A  Soldier  in  the  iPhilippines. 

two  and  myself  were  reported  captured  by  the 
Filipinos,  or  lost.  That  night  we  all  went  back 
into  Manila  to  resume  guard  and  patrol  duty. 
Police  duty  was  all  done  by  soldiers  until  a  force 
of  Macabees  was  organized.  The  Macabees  are 
enemies  of  the  Filipinos,  and  soon  became  our  al- 
lies and  were  very  good  soldiers  and  police. 

Manila  has  a  population  of  nearly  400,000  peo- 
ple of  different  tribes  and  nationalities.  It  is 
the  capital  of  Luzon  and  the  most  important  city 
of  the  Philippine  Islands.  The  energy  and  en- 
terprise is  due  to  foreigners.  There  are  several 
miles  of  narrow  gauge  street  railroad  and  a  sys- 
tem of  electric  lights. 

To  mingle  with  these  people  it  is  necessary 
to  know  two  or  three  languages,  if  not  more. 
Spanish  is  the  prevailing  language.  Most  of  the 
business  men  can  speak  several  languages. 

The  Chinese  are  the  filthiest  people  there.  I 
have  seen  hundreds  of  them  living  in  their  work- 
houses where  a  stench  was  arising  too  great  for 
a  white  man  to  approach.  These  filthy  people 
cook,  eat  and  sleep  all  in  this  filthy  hole.  Their 
principal  food  is  rise  and  soup.  One  dollar  of 
United  States  currency  will  buy  enough  for  one 
person  to  live  on  a  whole  month.  When  the  Amer- 
icans first  entered  Manila  it  was  very  filthy.  The 
air  reeked  from  the  accumulation  of  filth  during 
the  siege  of  the  city.  This  made  the  place  a  little 
worse  than  usual.  It  took  the  soldiers  three 
months  to  clean  out  and  clear  out  the  streets. 

The  only  thing  apparently  that  kept  down  a 
great  deal  of  disease  and  death  is  the  continual 
blowing  of  the  sea  breeze. 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      57 

Those  killed  in  battle  outside  the  city  had  been 
carried  in  and  buried  in  shallow  holes,  or  prob- 
ably I  would  be  more  correct  in  saying,  about  half 
covered  with  earth  and  left  that  way  for  dogs  to 
scratch  up  and  pull  about  by  the  arms  and  legs. 

I  have  seen  dead  Filipinos  carried  out  of  the 
hospital,  thrown  on  carts  and  carried  to  the  bury- 
ing ground  and  handled  like  dead  hogs.  They 
would  be  covered  a  little  and  left  to  the  dogs.  I 
don't  believe  I  ever  looked  towards  the  place  with- 
out seeing  dogs  there  eating  and  pulling  the 
bodies  about. 

Hundreds  of  beggars  are  to  be  seen  squatted 
down  at  all  public  places  and  on  the  street  corners. 
They  do  not  sit  down  like  Americans.  This  is  the 
case  with  all  the  natives.  They  sit  in  a  peculiar, 
squatting  way,  which  is  positively  tiring  to  any 
one  else  but  these  natives. 

The  Filipino  men  wear  trousers  rolled  up  high 
and  a  long  white  shirt  of  very  thin  material, 
the  tail  hanging  out  over  the  trousers  like  a 
sweater.  They  wear  nothing  on  the  feet  and  most 
of  them  wear  nothing  on  the  head.  They  are  not 
fond  of  clothing,  and  many  wear  very  little, 
almost  going  nude.  They  find  a  great  deal  of 
pleasure  in  the  possession  of  a  gun  and  it  seems 
that  they  are  content  with  a  gun,  fighting  and  run- 
ning in  the  mountains.  They  care  little  for  life 
and  will  fight  till  killed. 

A  squad  of  Filipinos  was  captured  near  Manila 
by  some  of  the  Fourteenth  Infantry;  when  they 
were  approached  to  give  over  their  guns  to  the  sol- 
diers they  would  make  a  motion  like  giving  up  a 
gun,  but  instead  jump  back  and  attempt  to  shoot 


58      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

a  soldier.  If  he  succeeded  in  shooting  an  Amer- 
ican some  other  American  would  shoot  the  Fili- 
pino.    Several  were  killed  in  this  manner. 

When  a  Filipino  is  captured  his  greatest  de- 
sire is  to  keep  possession  of  his  gun,  and  some- 
times fight  for  its  possession  after  being  captured. 

The  Filipinos  are  a  natural  race  of  gamblers; 
they  gamble  and  trade,  many  of  them,  for  a  living, 
refusing  to  work  as  long  as  they  can  get  anything 
to  eat  without  working  for  it.  Their  principal 
cause  for  idleness  is  the  cheapness  of  their  living, 
rice  and  fish  being  their  principal  food.  They  will 
catch  fish  and  throw  them  in  the  hot  sun  for  two 
or  three  days ;  they  are  then  taken  up  and  smoked 
and  burned  a  few  minutes  over  some  coals  and 
chunks,  and  then  eaten. 

If  any  Americans  are  watching  them  they  will 
say,  *%ucho  chico  wino,"  while  eating  this  deli- 
cacy of  their  indolence  and  filth.  The  Filipinos 
and  native  tribes  are  extremely  filthy  in  their  eat- 
ing, as  well  as  everything  else ;  they  eat  almost  any- 
thing that  an  American  will  refuse  to  eat. 

The  Macabees  is  another  negro  tribe  on  the 
Island  of  Luzon.  They  are  a  much  better  people 
than  the  Filipinos  and  more  intelligent.  This 
tribe  is  hostile  to  the  Filipinos,  and  fight  them 
whenever  an  opportunity  is  offered. 

Two  regiments  of  the  Macabees  were  organ- 
ized and  equipped  by  the  Americans,  and  placed 
in  the  field  against  the  Filipinos,  and  they  made 
very  good  soldiers. 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      59 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

I  MISSED  being  placed  on  a  detail  of  twenty- 
five  men  to  serve  on  a  gunboat;  I  wished  to  get 
out  on  some  kind  of  service  and  leave  the  regular 
and  dull  service  in  Manila.  I  missed  this  detail 
in  all  probability  by  being  out  in  the  town  when  the 
detail  was  being  made  out.  I  tried  to  get  on  when 
I  returned,  but  failed,  the  detail  having  been  made 
out  already.  This  detail  from  my  company  saw 
much  more  service  than  those  remaining  in  the 
company. 

Their  discharges  show  a  record  of  more  than  a 
dozen  engagements.  They  served  in  this  detail 
five  months,  and  had  plenty  of  hard  service.  They 
were  only  paid  once  during  the  five  months ;  a  few 
of  them,  however,  were  not  paid  until  discharged, 
if  I  was  correctly  informed.  Their  descriptive  list 
was  lost,  causing  two  men  to  have  to  serve  ten  days 
longer  than  they  enlisted  to  serve. 

Much  ^^kicking"  was  done  by  men  in  other  parts 
of  the  service  who  were  not  paid  for  a  year  or  more, 
but  all  to  no  purpose. 

I  was  on  the  alert  for  another  detail  to  be  made 
and  to  get  on.  At  last  I  succeeded,  on  the  tenth 
day  of  April,  in  getting  on  a  detail  of  only  ten  men 
to  perform  guard  duty  on  a  dredge  boat  that  was 
dredging  at  the  mouth  of  the  Malabon  river.    This 


60      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

was  twenty  miles  from  Manila.  The  object  of  the 
dredging  was  to  make  a  channel  in  the  shallow 
water  at  the  river's  mouth  sufficient  to  enable  gun 
boats  to  enter  the  river,  which  was  deeper  after 
leaving  its  mouth.  This  was  very  slow  v/ork,  re- 
quiring a  great  deal  of  time  and  labor  to  perform 
it.  This  dreging  had  been  going  on  for  a  month. 
We  were  on  duty  there  for  ten  days,  and,  judging 
by  what  I  saw,  it  must  have  required  two  months' 
more  work  to  open  the  desired  channel. 

From  our  station  numbers  of  natives  could  be 
seen  on  shore,  and  passing  up  and  down  the  river. 
It  seemed  that  the  country  was  full  of  Filipinos. 

We  watched  them  a  great  deal.  Their  methods 
of  catching  fish  was  very  interesting  to  us.  They 
never  used  a  pole,  hook  and  line  as  we  would.  At 
night  great  crowds  could  be  seen,  each  one  in  a 
boat,  and  carrying  a  big  torch.  They  would  be 
near  the  beach,  going  out  but  a  little  way  from  the 
edge  of  the  water;  they  would  beat  and  splash  in 
the  water,  and  drive  the  fish  into  large  traps  or 
nets,  just  like  a  hunter  driving  quail  into  a  net, 
only  the  fishermen  were  more  noisy. 

After  beating  the  water  and  banks  until  it  was 
supposed  the  fish  had  gone  into  the  net,  or  trap, 
they  were  left  in  it  until  next  day,  when  they  were 
seined  out.  Great  quantities  were  caught  in  this 
way. 

Another  method  of  fishing  was  to  get  in  a  boat 
with  a  long  gig  and  move  the  boat  slowly,  and  when 
a  fish  was  near  enough  gig  it.  The  large  fine  fish 
were  only  caught  in  this  way. 

Our  detail  returned  to  Manila  in  the  evening  of 
April  tenth,  and  remained  there  until  that  portion 


A  Soldier  in  the  Pliilippines.      61 

of  the  23d  Kegiment  was  ordered  to  the  Island 
of  Jolo,  where  we  started  on  the  seventeenth  day 
of  May.  I  had  been  in  the  old  walled  city  of 
Manila  a  little  more  than  six  months;  part  of  my 
regiment  had  been  there  ten  months.  We  had  had 
very  hard  service  there,  and  the  close  confinement, 
almost  like  imprisonment,  made  us  glad  to  change, 
and  held  out  a  hope  that  we  would  find  easier  serv- 
ice and  more  interesting. 

The  wall  of  the  old  city  of  Manila  extended 
entirely  around  the  old^  city.  The  sally  ports 
and  all  the  streets  were  always  guarded  until  no 
soldier  could  go  outside  without  exhibiting  a 
pass  to  the  guards  signed  by  the  company  and 
commanding  officers.  All  the  time  that  I  was 
stationed  there  I  was  never  out  without  the  re- 
quired pass. 

Guards  were  stationed  on  top  of  the  wall,  and 
made  it  unsafe  to  try  to  climb  it  to  get  out,  al- 
though I  have  seen  this  done  by  means  of  a  rope; 
men  would  pass  out  this  way  and  stay  out  as  late 
as  they  wished  to  and  return. 

This  was  not  safe.  Even  the  guards  did  not 
discover  the  attempt,  for  the  wall  was  not  less 
than  thirty  feet  high,  some  places  even  higher, 
and  forty  feet  wide.  Stone  houses  are  built 
in  this  wall,  and  used  for  military  stores.  On 
top  of  the  wall  on  the  sea-side  were  three  hun- 
dred large  cannon  when  the  city  was  surrendered 
to  the  Americans.  Around  the  old  Spanish  ar- 
senal about  two  acres  were  covered  with  cannon 
balls,  guns,  bayonets  and  rifles,  all  scattered  about 
in  a  mass  until  it  was  difficult  to  get  over  the 
ground.    It  required  two  months  of  the  Amer- 


62      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

lean's  time  to  pile  up  and  arrange  these  muni- 
tions of  war  surrendered  by  the  Spanish. 

After  the  treaty  of  peace  all  these  were  re- 
turned to  Spain. 

A  great  many  Spaniards  live  in  Manila,  and 
are  subjects  of  Spain.  They  have  some  very  pe- 
culiar customs.  One  that  came  to  my  notice  is 
that  of  the  courtship  of  a  Spanish  youth  and  his 
sweetheart. 

The  young  man  is  not  permitted  to  enter  his 
sweetheart's  home,  but  stands  on  the  outside  and 
makes  love  to  her  though  the  iron  bars  of  a  win- 
dow. I  saw  a  great  deal  of  this  before  I  learned 
what  it  all  meant. 

The  Spanish  seemed  to  have  a  very  bitter 
hatred  for  all  Americans  just  after  the  fall  of 
Manila.  When  we  first  entered  the  city  the 
Spanish  women  would  throw  anything  that  men- 
aced us  in  passing  the  streets,  from  their  win- 
dows. They  would  do  anything  to  harass  and 
endanger  the  lives  of  Americans  that  they  could 
think  of  without  exposing  themselves  too  much. 
Starvation  was  staring  them  in  the  face  when  the 
city  was  surrendered.  They  had  been  reduced  to 
rice  almost  wholly  for  sustenance.  The  pay  of 
the  Spanish  soldiers  was  very  small.  I  was  in- 
formed that  it  was  only  six  dollars  Spanish  per 
month,  equivalent  to  only  three  dollars  of  United 
States  currency.  Yet  this  meagre  sum  had  not 
been  paid  for  several  months. 

A  Spaniard  is  not  a  very  frank,  attractive  look- 
ing fellow  to  an  American  soldier.  He  has  a 
sneaking  countenance,  and  a  disposition  out  of 
harmony  with  that  of  the  American.     However, 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      63 

this  opinion  may  be  modified  somewhat  with  those 
able  to  speak  Spanish  and  become  better  ac- 
quainted with  them.  Being  unable  to  speak  their 
language  I  was  barred  from  this  possibility. 

Luzon  and  some  other  large  islands  are  very 
fertile,  and  under  proper  agricultural  manage- 
ment would  yield  millions  and  blossom  as  the 
rose,  but  as  yet  they  are  blighted  by  the  uncivil- 
ized natives.  A  man  would  be  taking  his  life 
in  his  hands  to  go  out  into  the  country  and  try 
to  engage  in  anything.  As  conditions  existed 
when  I  was  there,  bands  of  hostile  Filipinos  were  I 
scouring  the  whole  interior,  and  frequently  were  / 
bold  enough  to  raid  near  the  American  posts,  leav- 
ing devastation  wherever  they  went.  The  soil 
is  very  fertile,  a  warm  temperature  and  plenty 
of  water  to  irrigate  with  if  desired  for  that  pur- 
pose. 

The  natives  use  the  most  crude  implements,  /' 
and  have  but  very  little  knowledge  of  farming,  j 
and  are  too  indolent  to  put  into  practice  what 
little  they  do  know  of  soils  and  crops.  It  seems 
to  make  little  difference  what  season  they  plant 
in.  The  climate  is  always  warm,  most  of  the 
year  extremely  hot;  too  hot  for  an  American 
or  white  man,  to  labor  in.  It  is  just  the  climate 
that  suits  the  negro.  Chinese  and  negroes  work 
for  fifty  and  sixty  cents  per  day. 

A  very  fine  tobacco  is  raised,  and  most  of  it 
exported.  A  cigar  factory  in  Manila  manu- 
factures a  great  quantity  of  cigars. 

Eice  is  easily  raised,  and  is  the  principal  food 
of  the  natives. 

The  rough  rice  is  husked  in  a  very  crude  way ; 


64      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

a  wooden  trough,  or  dug  out,  is  used  to  put  the 
rough  rice  in,  and  chunks  of  wood  are  taken  in 
the  hands,  and  the  rice  is  pounded  with  these 
until  the  husks  are  all  broken  off,  the  rice  taken 
out  and  seperated  from  the  husks. 

Sugar  is  an  important  crop,  and  is  extensively 
raised.  No  less  than  fifteen  sugar  mills  could  be 
counted  from  the  top  of  the  walls  of  the  city  of 
Manila. 

Under  improved  methods  of  agriculture  that 
country  would  be  a  wonderful  one  in  the  produc- 
tion of  sugar  and  rice. 

The  Philippines  will,  in  all  probability,  become 
important  in  the  near  future  in  the  production 
of  minerals,  principally  gold.  There  are  some 
very  good  veins  of  goml5T6"in  the  mountains  of 
Luzon,  some  of  which  I  saw  myself.  Several 
pieces  of  stone  on  which  gold  was  easily  seen, 
were  picked  up  by  the  men  of  my  regiment.  I  saw 
rocks  with  both  gold  and  silver  in  them.  The  men 
would  not  tell  just  where  they  had  found  them. 
They  probably  thought  that  at  some  time,  after 
their  service  expired,  they  would  return  and  work 
the  places  found. 

I  knew  one  man,  an  old,  experienced  miner, 
who  would  spend  the  Sundays  out  in  the  hills 
and  around  the  foot  of  them,  where  he  was  not 
exposed  too  much  to  the  enemy,  prospecting  for 
gold.  He  was  successful  in  finding  good  indi- 
cations of  rich  minerals.  He  appeared  to  make 
a  confident  of  me.  At  one  time  he  showed  me 
a  lot  of  gold  and  some  silver  that  he  had  found 
out  on  his  prospecting  tours,  but  would  not  tell 
me  where  they  came  from.    He  told  me  that 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      65 

when  he  was  discharged  he  intended  to  return 
and  work  the  mines.  I  knew  that  the  paymaster 
had  considerable  money  belonging  to  this  old 
miner,  who  told  me  he  should  invest  it  in  the 
mines,  and  in  purchasing  mining  machinery. 

I  saw  and  heard  enough  to  cause  me  to  believe 
that  when  the  natives  are  civilized,  and  when 
men  would  be  safe  in  the  mountains,  that  the 
mines  in  the  Philippines  will  attract  more  people 
than  the  Klondike  ever  did.  There  are  advan- 
tages in  the  Philippines  which  are  not  found  in 
the  Klondike  region,  the  most  important  being 
the  climate,  not  considering  the  quality  of  the 
mines,  which  I  believe  to  be  equal  to  that  of  the 
Klondike. 

The  mountain  regions  are  rich  in  various  min- 
erals. 

In  the  Island  of  Mindanao  coal  has  been  mined 
ever  since  Americans  have  been  there. 

This  country  will  find  out  in  a  few  years  what 
is  in  the  Philippines.  I  believe  it  is  a  rich  coun- 
try. Almost  anjrthing  can  be  raised  that  is  de- 
sired in  the  line  of  field  and  garden  crops;  fine 
timber  is  plentiful  and  saw  mills  are  yet  unknown. 
I  don't  believe  there  is  a  saw  mill  in  the  Island 
of  Luzon.  All  sawed  timber  is  imported  that 
is  used  at  present;  not  much  is  used  in  building 
as  most  of  the  houses  are  built  of  stone  or  bam- 
boo. The  frame  buildings  which  we  have  in  Amer- 
ica are  never  seen  there.  All  the  native  houses 
and  small  towns  are  built  of  bamboo,  and  covered 
with  grass.  The  bamboo  grows  very  large,  the 
joints  are  two  and  three  feet  long,  and  some  of 
the  larger  bamboos  are  as  large  as  a  common  tree. 


66      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

They  'are  the  same  thing  that  people  in  this  coun- 
try know  as  canes,  the  difference  being  in  their 
size  only.  Houses  are  built  of  bamboo  witliout 
the  use  of  nail's.  Nothing  for  flooring  but  the 
naked  earth.  Split  bamboo  is  worked  into  the 
houses  fastening  the  whole  together.  I  have  seen 
the  natives  build  houses,  and  have  no  ether  tool 
than  a  large  knife.  The  roof  of  grass  is  fastened 
on  with  strips  of  bamboo,  and  is  three  to  four 
inches  thick.  This  roof  is  superior,  in  point  of 
comfort,  in  a  hot  country,  to  that  of  anything  I 
ever  saw.  I  have  been  in  the  hot  sun  and  in 
metal  roofed  buildings,  and  on  going  into  a  grass 
covered  house  the  difference  was  noticeable  imme- 
diately, the  grass  roofed  house  being  much  cooler. 

Manila  is  built  of  stone;  the  buildings  look 
very  old,  but  are  good  yet. 

One  night  when  the  Thirteenth  Minnesota  Eegi- 
ment  was  on  police  duty,  and  no  one  was  allowed 
on  the  streets  after  seven  o'clock  at  night,  with 
a  fellow  soldier  I  started  out  to  go  to  a  dance 
outside  of  the  city  walls;  we  knew  that  if  we 
were  caught  we  would  be  court  martialed.  To 
avoid  all  the  risk  possible  we  went  out  before 
seven  o'clock,  and  took  chances  on  getting  back 
to  quarters  safely.  We  could  not  return  to  our 
quarters  without  passing  sentinels,  that  much  was 
certain,  but  how  to  pass  them  safely  was  the 
question  then  most  imnortant  to  us.  I  had  an 
army  pistol,  and  with  that  in  mv  hand  I  directed 
my  friend  to  play  the  part  of  a  -nrisoner  and 
march  bpfore  me.  We  proceeded  in  that  way  only 
a  short  distance  when  a  craard  halted  us.  I  ex- 
plained that  I  had  a  prisoner  carrying  him  to 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      67 

headquarters.  The  guards  were  to  see  orders 
for  a  pass  or  whatever  orders  I  might  have,  but 
this  one  allowed  me  to  pass  on  with  my  prisoner 
without  showing  any  orders.  We  passed  in  by 
all  the  guards  and  patrols  on  the  streets,  and 
were  halted  and  some  questions  asked  and  an- 
swered, but  none  of  them  asked  to  see  any  orders 
regarding  my  prisoner,  who  all  the  time  was  just 
in  front  of  mc.  I  was  afraid  that  every  guard 
and  patrol  would  demand  my  orders,  and  then, 
our  schenie  would  fail,  and  we  would  be  in  trouble. 
I  told  them  it  was  late  and  I  must  hurry  in  with 
my  prisoner,  and  so  we  passed  them  all  and 
reached  our  quarters  in  safety.  The  men  worked 
a  great  many  schemes  to  get  out  and  in,  but  it 
was  for  my  friend  and  myself  to  play  the  part 
of  prisoner  and  guard  first. 

I  never  tried  any  more  schemes  on  the  guards, 
but  was  always  in  at  night ;  I  did  not  like  to  risk 
so  much  just  for  a  little  fun.  We  were  very  care- 
ful about  keeping  our  little  scheme  from  the 
officers,  but  told  some  of  our  comrades  about  it, 
and  enjoyed  the  joke  with  them. 


68      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 


CHAPTER  IX. 

On"  the  seventeenth  day  of  May  the  Thirteenth 
Regiment  and  two  battalions  of  the  23d  Regiment 
went  on  board  the  Spanish  transport,  "Leon/'  and 
sailed  for  the  Island  of  Jolo. 

I  was  a  member  of  one  of  the  battalions  of  the 
23d.  We  boarded  the  "Leon"  under  a  Spanish 
crew  and  sailed  under  the  Spanish  flag.  The 
^^Leon"  was  a  large  vessel  of  rapid  speed,  and  made 
the  run  from  Manila  to  the  Island  of  Jolo  in  a 
little  more  than  forty-eight  hours,  a  distance  of 
800  miles  south  of  Manila.  Land  was  in  sight 
almost  the  entire  voyage.  We  passed  through 
straits  and  seas,  by  Iloilo  on  the  Island  of  Panay, 
Cebu,  Negros  Island,  through  the  sea  of  Jolo  to 
Zamboanga  on  the  Island  of  Mindanao,  and  to 
Jolo.  The  group  of  islands  forming  the  Sulu 
Archipelago  is  the  southern  islands  of  the  Philip- 
pines. The  "Leon"  sailed  into  the  Jolo  Bay  in  the 
evening  on  the  nineteenth  of  May.  A  large  force 
of  Spanish  soldiers  was  stationed  in  the  town  per- 
forming garrison  duty.  Our  force  was  to  re- 
lieve them,  and  they  were  to  return  to  Spain  on 
the  transport  "Leon."  On  the  twentieth  of  May 
we  went  ashore.  The  Spanish  soldiers  seemed  to 
be  very  glad  to  be  relieved  and  return  to  Spain. 

The  garrison  was  short  of  rations,  and  the 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      6& 

soldiers  were  living  very  hard  when  we  relieved 
them.  These  Spanish  soldiers  were  the  last  who 
left  the  Philippines  for  Spain. 

We  were  landed  in  small  boats,  which  could 
not  carry  very  many  men.  The  boats  were  rowed 
by  Chinese.  All  supplies  have  to  be  carried  in 
by  these  small  boats.  It  is  a  very  slow  and  tedious 
piece  of  work  to  land  the  contents  of  a  large 
ship,  and  requires  several  days  to  do  the  work. 

Captain  Pratt  was  in  command,  and  Com- 
pany E  was  ordered  out  to  the  block  house,  which 
stands  about  one  thousand  yards  back  of  Jolo, 
and  towards  the  mountains.  A  guard  detail  was 
made  out,  and  the  Spanish  soldiers  were  relieved. 
I  relieved  the  first  Spanish  of  his  post  at  Jolo. 
When  I  approached  him  he  began  to  speak  in 
Spanish  and  tried  to  make  me  understand  what, 
I  supposed,  were  his  orders  he  was  turning  over 
to  me.  I  could  not  understand  him,  and  told 
him  to  go.  Of  course  I  had  enough  orders  with- 
out his,  if  that  was  what  he  was  trying  to  ex- 
plain to  me. 

The  Spanish  went  to  work  with  a  rush  getting 
everything  ready  to  leave.  They  had  been  there 
for  a  long  time.  I  learned  that  the  commanding 
officer,  who  was  an  old  man,  had  been  there 
twenty-eight  years.  In  the  evening  at  two  o'clock 
the  Spanish  flag  on  the  block  house  was  hauled 
down  by  the  Spanish  soldiers  and  the  Americans 
unfurled  to  the  breeze  the  Stars  and  Stripes. 
The  Spanish  seemed  to  be  very  much  grieved, 
the  officers  wept;  the  Americans  were  jubilant. 
Eveything  passed  into  our  hands,  and  the  vari- 
ous responsibilities  of  the  place  with  all  its  dan- 


70      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

gers  also  passed  to  us.  The  natives,  who  belong 
to  the  Morro  tribe,  are  treacherous.  We  knew 
nothing  about  them  and  their  intentions.  Guards 
were  put  on  duty  at  once,  six  being  around  the 
block  house  so  that  a  Morro  could  not  get  in  if 
the  attempt  were  made  to  enter  it,  and  thus 
made  it  a  place  of  security  to  our  troops.  The 
Morros  a  few  years  ago  massacred  more  than 
one  hundred  Spanish  soldiers  in  the  block  house 
Astora.  It  was  a  cruel  and  treacherous  piece  of 
cunning  of  savage  barbarians.  The  Morros  had 
been  warring  against  the  authority  of  Spain,  and 
causing  the  Spanish  troops  much  trouble.  At  last 
apparently  tired  of  rebelling,  the  Morros  agreed 
to  make  peace  with  the  Spanish.  According  to 
an  ancient  custom  of  the  Morros,  when  making 
peace  with  an  enemy  they  would  give  pearls  or 
some  other  gift  to  their  enemy.  The  captain  of 
that  Morro  company  was  going  to  make  peace, 
according  to  this  custom,  and  taking  some  fine 
pearls  and  a  body  guard  of  one  hundred  of  his 
men  he  entered  the  enclosure  where  the  Spanish 
soldiers  were  lined  up  in  two  columns  with  un- 
loaded arms  to  receive  them.  The  Morro  captain 
and  his  body  guard  marched  between  these  lines, 
and  as  the  guard  neared  the  Spanish  captain  the 
Morro  advanced  with  his  pearls,  and  getting  near 
the  Spaniard  instead  of  giving  him  the  pearls 
he  quickly  drew  his  sword  and  dealt  the  Spanish 
captain  a  death  blow.  The  Morros,  who  under- 
Btood  the  prearranged  treachery,  opened  fire  on 
the  Spaniards,  who  were  helpless  with  unloaded 
guns,  and  the  entire  garrison  of  more  than  one 
hundred  men  was  massacred  except  one  man, 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      71 

who,  in  the  noise  and  consternation,  succeeded  in 
crawling  into  a  sewer  pipe,  and  through  it  into 
a  big  stream  of  water,  and  escaped  without  in- 
jury. The  Morros  gave  the  Spanish  a  great  deal 
of  trouble,  probably  as  much  as  any  other  tribe 
of  the  Philippines.  The  Morros  have  a  bad 
record.  I  believe  that  I  had  rather  fight  the 
other  tribes  than  the  Morros;  they  are  more 
treacherous  than  other  tribes.  They  go  armed 
ail  the  time  with  the  bolo,  a  large  knife  carried 
in  a  wooden  scabbard.  From  the  oldest  man  down 
to  little  boys,  they  all  carry  the  bolo  or  a  big  knife. 
I  have  seen  old  men,  so  feeble  they  could  scarcely 
walk,  carrying  a  fine  bolo.  They  will  not  part 
with  them  day  or  night,  but  keep  them  as  their  only 
friend,  refusing  to  let  any  one  take  them  from 
their  hands  to  merely  look  at  them.  These  arms 
are  very  fine,  and  range  in  cost  from  five  to  fifty 
dollars.  They  are  manufactured  of  the  very 
finest  steel,  the  handle  of  many  of  them  is  made 
of  silver  and  finely  engraved.  The  edge  is  kept 
very  sharp.  The  blow  of  this  dangerous  weapon 
is  generally  enough  to  kill  a  man.  I  was  informed 
that  a  Morro  never  struck  his  enemy  but  two  blows 
with  his  bolo,  one  on  each  side;  if  that  did  not 
disable  him  the  Morro  would  run  for  his  life. 

A  steel  armor  is  worn  by  a  few  of  them,  to 
furnish  protection  to  their  bodies.  But  most  of 
the  tribe  would  rather  risk  their  life  than  wear  any- 
thing, even  clothing.  Only  a  piece  of  cloth  is 
worn  around  the  waist  and  loins.  In  this  piece 
of  cloth  is  carried  a  box  containing  a  stuff  to 
chew  called  beadle  nut.  Only  the  married  men 
are  allowed  to  use  this,  as  they  have  a  law  pro- 


12      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippine^. 

hibiting  its  use  by  the  single  men.  It  is  a  soft 
green  nut  growing  on  a  tree  which  looks  very 
much  like  a  hickory  tree.  A  piece  of  the  nut 
is  placed  on  a  leaf,  which  is  always  carried  in  the 
chewing  box,  and  some  salve  is  also  placed  on  the 
leaf,  then  the  piece  of  nut  and  the  salve  is  rolled 
up  in  the  leaf,  and  the  chew  is  ready  for  use. 
The  married  men  can  be  very  easily  distinguished 
from  the  unmarried  ones  simply  by  the  use  of 
this,  which  makes  the  chewer's  mouth  as  red  as 
red  paint  and  the  teeth  black.  The  teeth  of  the 
single  men  are  very  white,  but  just  as  soon  as 
one  marries  he  begins  chewing  beadle  nuts,  mak- 
ing his  mouth  red  and  teeth  black  in  a  few  days. 
Their  marriage  customs  are  not  exactly  like  ours 
in  America.  A  Morro  can  marry  a  woman,  or 
buy  one  for  a  price  ranging  from  fifty  dollars  up 
to  one  hundred  and  twenty-five  dollars.  KHqv 
marrying  a  woman  or  buying  one,  if  she  doesn't 
suit  her  husband  he  uoesn't  have  to  wait  for  a 
court  to  set  aside  the  marriage,  but  can  simply 
let  her  go  and  proceed  to  get  another  in  the  same 
manner. 

The  men  are  prohibited  from  having  a  plurality 
of  wives  at  one  time,  but  are  allowed  to  have  just 
as  many  as  they  desire,  simply  getting  rid  of 
one  and  then  getting  another. 

The  women  wear  big  legged  trousers,  which 
only  reach  down  to  the  knees.  Sometimes  women 
are  seen  with  more  clothes  on,  but  they  look  as  if 
they  were  torn  almost  off.  The  clothing  of  both 
men  and  women  is  worn  out  before  they  ever 
change.  A  few  who  lived  in  the  towns  wore 
more  clothing  than^  those  in  the  country.     The 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      73 

men  wore  pants  which  seemed  to  cling  to  the 
skin,  they  were  so  tight.  Those  in  town  were  no 
cleaner  than  outsiders.  They  get  so  filthy  and 
slick  that  an  American  can  smell  one  as  far  almost 
as  he  can  see.  The  more  clothes  a  Morro  wears 
(the  filthier  he  is.  Those  wearing  no  clothing,  ex- 
cept the  girdle  around  the  loins,  are  the  less  filthy. 
'Nothing  is  worn  on  the  head  and  feet. 

Leprosy  is  a  common  malady,  as  well  as  numer- 
ous other  diseases  of  the  skin.  All  of  which 
doubtless  arises  from  the  filthy  habits  of  the 
people.  Doby  itch  is  very  common.  It  is  a  very 
bad  skin  disease,  and  hard  to  cure  when  it  gets 
a  firm  hold,  and  will  have  fatal  results  in  a  few 
years  in  that  warm  climate.  One  doctor  said 
that  it  would  require  three  or  four  years'  careful 
treatment  to  cure  an  acute  case  of  doby  itch  in 
another  climate. 

Almost  every  day  I  saw  a  bad  case  of  it.  The 
legs  will  become  swollen,  and  large  knots  and 
tumors  cover  them  until  walking  is  extremely 
painful.  It  is  easy  to  contract  doby  itch.  About 
two  weeks  after  I  reached  Manila  the  first  time, 
I  discovered  a  small  sore  spot  on  my  leg,  which 
looked  like  ringworm.  I  was  informed  that  it 
was  doby  itch,  and  that  I  should  have  it  doctored 
before  it  spread.  I  began  to  treat  it,  and  it 
itched  seemingly  to  the  bone,  and  began  to  scatter. 
I  would  wake  at  night  scratching  and  clawing  the 
itching  spot,  and  lie  awake  for  two  and  three  hours. 
I  had  to  trim  my  finger  nails  closely  to  keep  from 
ruining  my  leg  scratching  it.  It  continued  this 
way  for  several  days  before  I  checked  it.    Many 


74      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

of  our  soldiers  had  a  similar  experience,  some  of 
them  much  worse  than  mine.  I  guarded  against 
it  afterward,  using  all  the  precaution  I  could  to 
avoid  it.  A  friend  of  mine  who  enlisted  when  I 
did,  caught  a  severe  case  of  the  doby  itch  which 
kept  him  in  an  almost  helpless  condition  for 
eight  months.  He  was  finally  discharged  for  dis- 
ability, a  wreck  for  life,  without  anything  but 
a  small  pension  of  about  eight  dollars  per  month. 

To  the  Morros  again.  There  is  a  class  whose 
religious  teaching  is  that  when  one  of  them  kills 
seven  white  men  he  will  go  to  a  better  country 
when  he  dies.  He  thus  makes  sure  of  his  en- 
trance to  what  is  heaven  in  their  religious  belief. 

The  Americans  soon  learned  to  distinguish  one 
of  this  class,  and  watched  them  very  closely. 
One  of  them  will  not  wait  for  much  of  a  chance 
to  kill  a  white  man,  but  will  make  his  chance 
to  do  his  deadly  work.  I  have  seen  a  great  many 
of  them,  and  know  that  they  attempted  to  kill 
our  men  on  duty  as  outposts.  They  would  not 
have  any  guns  and  would  go  to  the  walls  of  the 
fort  and  try  to  scale  them  to  get  to  the  Amer- 
icans and  kill  them  with  bolos.  Without  trying 
to  kill  them  the  soldiers  would  shoot  towards  them 
to  drive  them  away.  When  one  of  their  number 
dies  the  grave  is  dug  one  day  and  early  the  fol 
lowing  morning  the  funeral  begins.  Every  one 
carries  something  to  eat,  a  big  bottle  full  of  beno 
(a  native  beverage)  and  a  bottle  of  whiskey. 
Four  men  carry  the  corpse  on  two  small  poles, 
all  the  others  fall  in  behind  in  column  of  twos 
and  then  they  proceed  to  the  graveyard,  drink- 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      75 

ing  their  beverage  and  enjoying  themselves.  The 
crowd  stays  at  the  graveyard  all  day,  and  drink 
and  caronse  until  they  are  well  filled  with  liquor, 
and  all  get  drunk.  This  is  the  program  every 
time  one  of  them  is  buried.  It  is  a  big  picnic 
for  them. 

Once  a  year  regularly  they  prepare  some  of  the 
best  rations  they  have  and  carry  them  to  the 
graves  and  leave  them  there  through  the  night, 
believing  that  these  are  enjoyed  by  the  dead.  I 
learned  that  this  was  an  ancient  custom  of  theirs, 
having  been  learned  probably  from  the  Chinese. 

The  Morros  seem  not  to  care  for  anything,  not 
even  for  life.  A  large  number,  probably  two- 
thirds,  never  had  any  home.  They  did  not  know 
where  they  would  go,  and  seemed  not  to  care. 

Some  of  the  islands  had  two  or  more  tribes  of 
negroes,  who  would  have  a  governor  to  each  tribe 
and  make  laws  for  themselves.  If  natives  of  one 
tribe  crossed  the  line  into  the  territory  of  an- 
other and  stole  fruits,  cocoanuts,  or  anything  else, 
and  the  injured  tribe  could  catch  the  thief  or 
thieves,  their  heads  were  cut  off  and  their  bodies 
left  on  the  spot.  This  is  according  to  their  laws. 
Beheading  for  theft,  and  leaving  the  bodies  where 
they  were  beheaded.  I  have  seen  five  or  six  in 
this  condition  two  or  three  times. 

One  tribe  would  sometimes  array  itself  against 
another  for  battle  and  fight  till  great  numbers 
of  them  were  killed.  Our  troops  stopped  several 
such  battles  by  going  out  where  they  commenced 
to  fight.  As  soon  as  we  would  arrive  they  would 
stop  fighting,  and  there  seemed  to  be  an  end  of 
the  trouble  between  them.     They  appeared  to  be 


76      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

in  great  fear  of  our  guns.  They  have  a  few  old 
rusty  guns,  which  are  only  used  to  fight  enemies 
of  other  countries;  never  using  them  to  fight  each 
other  with.  When  General  Bates  made  a  treaty 
of  peace  with  the  Sultan  of  Jolo,  the  sultan  was 
received  by  General  Bates  the  first  Sunday  in 
May,  1900;  we  were  drawn  up  in  line  and  pre- 
sented arms  to  his  excellency.  The  sultan  was 
to  maintain  peace  on  the  island  of  Jolo,  for  which 
he  was  to  receive  500  dollars  Mexican  coin  every 
month.  We  presented  arms  to  him,  and  were 
forced  to  treat  him  with  great  honors.  I  can 
assure  the  reader  that  for  myself  it  would  have 
been  more  pleasant  to  have  gone  out  to  meet  him 
on  the  battlefield,  and  when  I  speak  thus  I  feel 
safe  to  make  the  assertion  that  many  more  were 
of  the  same  disposition. 

After  these  formalities  were  over  I  had  oppor- 
tunity of  examining  the  guns  of  the  sultan's 
body  guard,  also  the  ammunition.  The  guns 
were  so  rusty  that  I  would  have  considered  it 
safer  to  be  shot  at  by  one  of  them  than  to  shoot 
the  gun.  The  barrels  were  almost  closed  with 
rust. 

A  lot  of  the  bullets  were  wrapped  with  cloth, 
and  stuck  in  the  shells.  Some  of  the  bullets 
were  loose,  and  some  were  driven  in  very  tight. 
All  of  the  shells  had  the  appearance  of  being  in 
use  a  long  time,  and  that  they  had  been  fired  as 
many  times  as  they  would  stand. 

A  man  was  taking  his  life  in  his  hands  to  go  out 
into  the  country  alone.  Many  people  have  been 
killed  in  this  way.     There  is  a  tribe  that  would  cut 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      77 

ioff  a  man's  head  for  amusement,  or  to  see  how  it 
looks. 

Guards  were  kept  on  duty  all  the  time,  and  no 
American  was  permitted  to  go  outside  of  the  wall 
without  having  a  pass.  This  was  kept  up  for  a 
long  time  after  we  went  to  Jolo,  and  was  then  re- 
stricted to  one  thousand  yards  from  the  fort,  and 
no  less  than  four  men  together.  The  Morros  gave 
us  very  little  trouble,  doubtless  the  result  of  ex- 
treme caution.  They  never  had  an  opportunity  of 
making  any  demonstration,  so  it  is  uncertain  what 
they  would  have  attempted  had  the  opportunity 
been  given  them.  They  are  too  treacherous  to  be 
trusted  about  anything  whatever. 

They  have  very  little  knowledge  of  firearms; 
probably  the  only  guns  they  ever  had,  and  also 
those  of  the  sultan's  body  guard,  were  old,  worn-out 
guns  given  or  sold  to  them  by  the  Spanish.  With 
our  improved  rifles  I  believe  that  one  man  could 
withstand  the  attack  of  twenty  of  them  armed  with 
bolos,  that  is  to  say,  were  the  American  in  some 
fortification,  and  opened  fire  on  the  Morros  when 
they  came  in  his  range.  They,  of  course,  would 
not  fight  in  this  way,  their  method  being  one  of 
sneaking  treachery.  They  slip  up  behind  the  un- 
suspecting victim  and  behead  him  with  their  bolo. 

I  was  anxious  for  them  to  engage  the  Amer- 
icans in  a  fight.  I  desired  to  know  something 
more  of  their  methods,  but  they  seemed  not  to  care 
to  fight  us.  They  are  a  wandering  people,  seem- 
ingly with  no  definite  purpose.  As  night  suits 
their  sneaking  better  than  open  day  time  they  do 
as  much  traveling,  or  more,  in  the  night  than  in 
the  day  time.    They  could  be  seen  on  the  hills 


78      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

around  Jolo  with  torches  moving  about  all  night. 
When  we  first  went  to  Jolo  and  saw  these  torches 
at  night  we  thought  they  were  signals,  and  close 
watch  was  kept  on  their  movements. 

They  evidently  made  some  preparations  for 
resisting  us  at  first,  and  stored  away  such  arms 
as  they  could  obtain,  for  later  I  saw  twenty-eight 
new  Mauser  rifles  hidden  in  an  abandoned  house 
on  the  beach.  Another  soldier  and  I  secured  a 
pass  and  went,  at  the  risk  of  our  lives,  beyond 
the  limit  of  our  pass,  and  on  this  outing  discovered 
the  hidden  Mausers.  We  went  up  the  beach  about 
fifteen  miles,  and  went  into  two  towns  where  there 
were  a  great  many  Morros.  We  watched  their 
movements  very  closely,  and  kept  at  some  dis- 
tance from  them,  and  never  bothered  anything 
or  any  one.  They  watched  us  very  closely,  and 
acted  to  us  very  strangely,  but  made  no  effort  to 
get  near  us.  We  were  a  little  frightened  and 
thought  it  safer  to  get  away  from  them,  when  we 
started  on  our  return,  the  nearest  and  quickest 
route  that  we  could.  Our  pistols  were  no  doubt 
the  instrument  of  keeping  them  away  from  us, 
and  at  the  same  time  tempted  them  to  kill  us 
to  secure  them. 

Some  of  the  soldiers  were  afterwards  killed, 
and  their  guns  and  cartridges  taken.  It  was 
very  dangerous  for  two  or  three  men  to  be  out 
in  the  woods  away  from  any  help.  In  the  moun- 
tains of  Jolo  and  Mindanao  are  wild  cannibals, 
who  would  kill  and  eat  a  white  man  should  he 
be  found  in  their  midst.  We  were  not  allowed  to 
go  out  in  the  mountains,  but  the  places  where  we 
were  prohibited  from  going  by  orders  of  the  com- 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      79 

manders  were  the  places  most  desirable  of  all  for 
us  to  slip  out  and  go  to.  The  dangers  to  us  by 
going  out  were  only  fascinating  rather  than  hin- 
dering. 

It  was  my  belief  while  there  that  the  natives 
were  gathering  up  and  storing  away  arms  and 
ammunition  preparatory  for  resisting  the  Amer- 
icans when  they  thought  the  proper  opportunity 
was  offered.  The  guns  I  saw  hidden  in  the  house 
on  the  beach,  and  many  other  things,  led  me  to 
this  belief.  They  claimed  to  have  some  big  guns 
posted  back  in  the  mountain.  Whether  this  was 
true  or  not  I  am  unable  to  say,  for  we  never  went 
to  ascertain  the  correctness  of  the  story.  While 
stationed  at  Jolo  a  vessel  arrived  loaded  with 
ammunition  for  the  sultan.  It  was  discovered 
and  taken  into  custody  by  the  custom  house 
guards. 


80      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 


CHAPTER  X. 

All  the  larger  islands  have  an  abundance  of 
game,  wild  hogs,  chickens  and  deer.  Wild  dogs 
are  plentiful  in  the  woods.  They  are  very  w^ild, 
running  oif  almost  at  sight  of  a  man.  At  night 
they  seem  to  be  bolder  and  come  around  the  out- 
side wall  and  howl  so  much  that  people  are  kept 
awake  all  night. 

A  detail  was  sent  out  by  our  commander's  orders 
to  lie  in  hiding  and  shoot  them  when  they  ap- 
proached near  enough.  We  could  see  them  away 
off  during  the  day  in  the  grass,  but  could  not  get 
to  shoot  them.  The  only  chance  for  that  was  to 
hide  at  night  and  wait  for  them.  We  frequently 
went  out  and  killed  a  number  of  nice  fat  wild 
hogs  and  carried  them  in  and  feasted  while  they 
lasted.  These  animals  were  very  wild,  like  the 
dogs.  A  man  on  the  ground  could  not  get  near 
enough  for  a  good  shot — they  would  discover  him 
and  run.  We  would  climb  a  tree  and  wait  for 
them. 

The  town  of  Siasse,  on  Tai  Tai  Island,  was  the 
station  of  Company  H  for  three  months.  Morros 
almost  swarmed  on  the  island.  The  captain  of 
the  company  permitted  a  squad  of  men  every  few 
days  to  go  hog  hunting  when  the  supply  of  meat 
began  to  get  short,    Some  of  the  Morros  were 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      81 

trusted  by  the  soldiers  and  were  allowed  fre- 
quently to  go  out  with  the  soldiers  on  a  hog  hunt, 
as  these  trusted  ones  were  thought  to  be  harmless. 
One  day  the  captain  sent  out  five  men  early  in  the 
morning  to  hunt  hogs.  They  hunted  until  tired 
in  the  evening,  when  four  of  them  sat  down  to  rest 
and  play  a  few  games  of  cards,  while  the  fifth 
went  to  the  beach  near  by  and  bathed  his  feet. 

A  crowd  of  Morros,  twenty  or  more,  gathered 
around  the  players  to  see  the  game.  The  soldiers 
were  not  afraid  of  them  doing  any  mischief,  as  the 
Morros  appeared  friendly  and  quiet.  As  the 
game  progressed  and  became  more  interesting  the 
players  became  less  conscious  of  their  position, 
and  those  standing  around. 

To  be  more  comfortable  and  have  better  use  / 
of  their  bodies  and  limbs  their  belts  were  taken/ 
off  and  laid  by  them  with  their  guns.     The  Morros 
gathered  around  the  soldiers  saw  the  opportunity 
for  mischief  and  seized  upon  it  at  once.     They 
seized  the  soldiers^  guns  and  belts,  while  six  of 
them  drew  their  bolos  and  began  their  deadly 
work.     The  first  soldier  who  was  struck  with  a 
bolo  had  his  head  cut  off  at  one  blow.     The  sol- 
diers were  making  a  desperate  fight  for  life  against 
what  seemed  no  chance  for  success.     Two  soldiers 
were  killed  in  the  fight,  another  grabbed  for  his 
gun;  getting  hold  of  it  he  received  a  heavy  bloW| 
on  the  head  with  a  club,  was  cut  dangerously  in\ 
the  neck,  but  succeeded  in  securing  his  gun  so\ 
that  he  could  fire  it.     The  firing  frightened  the  \ 
Morros,   who   commenced   running.     The   soldier 
on  the  beach  ran  back  where  he  left  his  comrades 
.when  he  heard  the  shooting,  but  the  Morros  were 


82      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

then  out  of  sight.  Two  soldiers  lay  on  the  ground 
dead,  another  was  cut  so  much  that  he  bled  to 
death  before  they  could  get  him  back  to  camp, 
while  the  one  who  did  the  shooting  had  a  terri- 
ble wound  in  his  neck  and  had  received  a  heavy 
blow  on  the  head. 

It  was  a  long  way  to  camp,  and  one  boat  with 
room  enough  for  two  oarsmen.  Night  was  almost 
on,  and  the  situation  was  perilous  in  the  extreme. 
The  man  who  was  not  in  the  fight  carried  the  dead 
and  wounded  men  to  the  little  boat,  and  set  out 
for  camp  as  rapidly  as  possible.  As  above  stated 
one  more  died  while  being  carried  to  camp,  mak- 
ing three  dead  and  another  with  his  head  almost 
half  off.  The  sea  was  a  little  rough,  and  only 
one  man  rowing,  with  a  feeble  help  of  the  wounded 
man  with  one  hand,  made  slow  progress. 

Camp  was  reached  at  three  o'clock  next 
morning.  The  wounded  man  recovered  but  could 
not  turn  his  head ;  when  he  looked  around  he  had 
to  turn  his  whole  body,  and  was  discharged  from 
the  service  for  disability.  He  draws  a  pension 
of  thirty-six  dollars  per  month.  Next  day  after 
the  Morros  killed  and  wounded  the  hunting  party, 
sixty  men  were  sent  out  to  capture  the  mur- 
derers. The  chief  of  the  Morros  was  offered  a 
large  reward  for  capturing  them  and  turning 
them  over  to  the  Americans.  The  Morro  chief 
captured  them,  turned  them  over  to  the  Amer- 
icans, who  then  failed  to  pay  the  reward  as  previ- 
ously promised.  Six  Morros  were  all  that  were 
guilty;  these  were  bound  together^  carried  out  of 
camp  and  shot. 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.     83 


CHAPTER  XL 

Seassa  is  situated  ninety  miles  south  of  Jolo. 
Few  of  the  men  liked  to  be  on  duty  there.  At 
first  entrance  of  our  troops  they  had  to  go  into 
camp,  as  there  were  no  barracks.  Barracks  were 
built  later  at  Seassa  and  Buangior  by  the  soldiers 
stationed  at  these  places.  The  captains  of  those 
companies  were  mean  and  cruel  to  their  men, 
and  worked  them  very  hard.  Some  men  were  al- 
most killed  by  the  hard  work  at  these  barracks 
and  in  the  swamps  cutting  timbers  for  their  con- 
struction. Some  while  at  work  in  the  swamps 
had  mud  slashed  in  their  eyee  and  almost  put  out. 
The  mud  poisoned  them.  Some  had  their  feet 
poisoned  by  the  black  mud.  The  captains  made 
the  soldiers  do  the  work,  instead  of  hiring  natives, 
and  kept  the  money  appropriated  for  this  work 
and  used  it  for  their  own  benefit. 

A  soldier  had  no  opportunity  to  report  such 
frauds.  If  he  wrote  to  the  department  com- 
mander to  report  anything  without  the  permis- 
sion of  his  immediate  commander  he  would  be 
court  martialed.  And  of  course  an  officer  guilty 
of  such  conduct  was  not  generous  enough  to  per- 
mit a  private  to  report  his  conduct  to  a  superior 
officer,  and  thus  the  privates  were  ill  treated  by 
^om^  unscrupulous  officers. 


84      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

The  hardships  of  the  service  were  greatly  in- 
creased or  diminished  according  to  the  honesty 
and  nnrightness  of  the  officers  in  command.  A 
private  is  only  a  tool  in  the  hands  of  his  officers, 
and  can  be  managed  just  as  they  please  as  long 
as  the  private  remains  in  the  service.  I  always 
thought  it  better  to  obey  all  orders,  agreeable  or 
disagreeable,  and  serve  out  my  time  of  enlist- 
ment and  get  a  good  discharge,  and  then  be  free 
and  independent.  I  enlisted  merely  to  get  the 
experience  of  army  life,  and  to  know  Just  what 
the  service  really  is.  I  found  out  to  my  satisfac- 
tion all  about  the  army  that  I  cared  to  know. 
The  army  is  all  right  when  its  officers  are  all 
right.  But  many  of  them  fall  far  short  of  the 
standard — officers  who  will  not  give  a  private 
justice  as  he  should. 

A  few  soldiers  deserted  the  army.  I  cannot 
blame  a  man  much  for  it.  Some  had  good  cause. 
But  to  desert  the  army  in  the  Philippines  and  at- 
tempt to  get  away  from  the  islands  is  almost  im- 
possible. Any  one  leaving  there  must  have  a 
passport  to  present  when  they  attempt  to  go  on 
board  any  vessel,  and  then  if  the  passports  are 
not  properly  executed  they  cannot  go  on  board. 

I  know  of  a  few  soldiers  trying  to  get  away, 
but  the  farthest  point  they  reached  was  Hong 
Kong.     They  would  be  caught  very  easily. 

The  one  who  reached  Hong  Kong  was  appre- 
hended by  English  officers  and  returned  to  Manila 
and  delivered  to  the  American  authorities. 

One  man  who  enlisted  in  Manila  was  discovered 
to  be  a  spy  for  the  Filipinos,  securing  all  the 
information  possible  for  the  advantage   of  the 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      85 

Filipinos,  and  conveying  it  to  them  at  every  op- 
portunity. This  spy  had  gone  with  a  company 
to  which  he  was  assigned,  to  Bungio  for  duty. 
While  at  Bungio  he  induced  two  other  soldiers  to 
desert  their  company  and  go  with  him  to  the 
Filipinos,  promising  each  a  commission  in  the 
Filipino  army.  He  was  an  officer  in  the  Filipino 
army,  and  a  very  dangerous  man,  resorting  to  all 
kinds  of  schemes  and  treachery  to  accomplish  his 
purposes.  Having  pursuaded  two  soldiers  to  go 
with  him  they  seized  a  small  Morro  boat,  and 
with  their  rifles  and  a  good  supply  of  ammuni- 
tion they  set  out  in  the  darkness  of  the  night 
headed  for  the  island  of  Mindanao.  Ninety  miles 
of  water  lay  before  them  and  their  small  boat. 
They  encountered  a  rough  sea,  lost  their  bearings, 
and  finally  the  boat  capsized,  and  they  lost  their 
clothing  and  one  gun  after  a  battle  with  the  sea 
for  three  days.  Instead  of  reaching  Mindanao 
they  drifted  on  the  Island  of  Jolo,  about  twenty 
miles  from  the  town  of  Jolo,  almost  starved  to 
death.  In  preparing  for  their  trip  they  had  not 
thought  as  much  about  rations  as  about  ammu- 
nition. They  fell  into  the  hands  of  the  Morros, 
who  carried  them  to  Jolo  and  delivered  them  to 
the  Americans,  who  placed  them  in  prison.  Two 
of  the  poor  fellows^  feet  were  blistered  all  over 
by  marching  over  the  hot  sands,  having  lost 
their  shoes  when  the  boat  capsized.  These  two 
were  unable  to  walk  for  some  time.  They  were 
tried  and  sentenced  to  terms  of  imprisonment 
from  five  to  six  years.  This  was  the  common  fate 
of  all  who  tried  to  desert  the  army  and  get  away. 
I  was  on  duty  on  several  islands  and  in  many 


86      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

towns  in  the  Philippines,  but  Jolo  suited  me  bet- 
ter for  service  as  a  soldier  than  any  other  place 
I  was  in.  I  was  on  duty  in  Jolo  for  thirteen 
months,  and  know  a  great  deal  about'  the  place. 
Most  all  the  soldiers  who  did  service  there  liked 
it.  Sailors  enjoyed  their  visits  to  Jolo.  Quite 
a  number  of  sailors  told  me  that  they  had  been 
in  a  great  many  towns  of  the  tropical  countries, 
but  that  they  would  rather  live  in  Jolo  than  any 
of  them.  The  most  undesirable  feature  of  the 
town  is  that  there  are  no  pleasure  retreats  except 
to  go  to  the  mountains  and  among  the  Morros, 
and  besides,  we  soldiers  were  confined  very  closely 
within  the  walls  and  on  duty.  The  town  is  very 
small.  A  man  can  walk  all  through  in  less  than 
an  hour. 

I  have  known  of  recruits  on  going  into  Jolo 
express  their  delight  at  the  idea  of  doing  duty 
in  such  a  fine  place,  and  wish  they  could  stay 
there  the  three  years  of  service  for  which  they 
had  enlisted.  But  in  less  than  two  months,  see- 
ing the  same  things  every  day,  they  wanted  to 
get  away,  and  would  have  given  anything  for  an 
opportunity  to  go  to  another  post.  Everything 
became  monotonous,  and  seemed  somehow  to  be 
wrong. 

This  seemed  to  be  the  common  experience  of 
all.  The  town  is  beautifully  laid  out  with  broad 
streets,  which  are  set  with  beautiful  shade  trees 
that  are  green  winter  and  summer.  A  person 
can  walk  all  over  town  the  hottest  days  and  be 
in  the  shade  all  the  time. 

Three  small,  but  very  nice  parks  with  beauti- 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      87 

ful  and  delightfully  fragrant  flowers  and  shrub- 
bery lend  a  charm  to  the  town. 

I  have  been  walking  out  in  the  town  at  night, 
and  would  "smell  the  sweet  odors  from  the  parks 
for  two  or  three  blocks  away.  This  was  not  oc- 
casionally so,  but  all  the  time.  The  soldiers  en- 
joyed sitting  in  the  parks  and  on  the  piers  at 
night,  taking  in  the  cool  sea  breeze  after  a  hot 
day.  I  have  seen  as  many  as  three  and  four  hun- 
dred soldiers  sitting  out  on  the  piers  before  going 
into  quarters. 

As  in  all  other  parts  of  the  Philippines,  chicken 
fighting  is  a  favorite  sport  in  Jolo.  Outside  of 
the  city  wall  is  built  a  grand  stand  and  pit  for 
chicken  fighting.  It  is  all  enclosed,  and  ten  cents 
(Mexican)  admission  is  charged  unless  you  have 
a  chicken  to  enter.  Some  fine  chickens  are  en- 
tered in  these  fights,  and  a  great  deal  of  money 
is  put  up  on  them.  Gambling  is  not  prohibited, 
and  chicken  fighting  is  engaged  in  every  Satur- 
day all  day  long.  The  natives  will  gamble  away 
the  last  cent  they  possess  before  they  will  stop. 
A  suburban  town  of  Jolo  is  Buss  Buss,  nearly  half 
as  large  as  Jolo,  and  built  out  over  the  water  on 
bamboo  poles  driven  into  the  mud,  and  left  pro- 
jecting above  the  water.  The  houses  are  then 
built  on  these  poles. 

Buss  Buss  is  built  over  shallow  water,  running 
out  over  the  water  for  one  hundred  and  fifty  yards. 
The  houses  are  all  built  of  bamboo.  This  seems 
to  be  a  Chinese  town.  Many  Chinese  live  there 
and  engage  in  business  in  Jolo.  Chinese  are  en- 
gaged in  various  kinds  of  business  in  Jolo,  but  all 
live  in  Buss  Buss.    The  Chinese  and  Morros  are 


88      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

not  friendly,  and  it  is  probably  due  to  this  fact 
alone  that  caused  Buss  Buss  to  be  built. 

Major  Sweet  was  in  command  of  the  post  at 
Jolo  for  some  time.  He  would  not  allow  more 
than  one  hundred  Morros  inside  the  city  walls 
at  one  time  for  fear  of  trouble  with  them.  The 
Morros  supplied  our  forces  with  vegetables,  fish 
and  fruit,  which  they  brought  in  and  sold  to  us. 
To  prevent  the  town  from  filling  up  with  Morros 
a  strong  guard  was  stationed  at  the  gate,  which 
was  closed  at  six  in  the  evening  and 
opened  at  six  o'clock  in  the  morning.  The  Morros 
would  be  crowded  around  the  outside  of  the 
gate  every  morning  waiting  for  it  to  be  opened 
to  go  in  and  dispose  of  their  produce.  Fre- 
quently there  would  be  twice  as  many  as  were 
allowed  inside  at  one  time.  When  the  gate  was 
opened  they  would  rush  for  it,  but  not  more  than 
one  hundred  were  allowed  to  pass  inside.  When 
one  disposed  of  his  produce,  etc.,  and  returned 
to  the  gate  he  was  allowed  to  pass  out,  and  an- 
other from  the  outside  could  pass  in,  and  so  on 
until  all  had  been  in  and  passed  back. 

Not  far  from  Jolo,  out  towards  the  foot  of  the 
mountains,  is  a  coffee  field.  There  are  several 
others  on  the  island  besides  that  one.  In  these  cof- 
fee fields  a  great  many  Morros  work  all  the  time 
gathering  and  cleaning  coffee,  etc.  The  method 
is  like  all  others  of  theirs,  very  rude  and  poor. 
They  dig  out  long  troughs  of  wood  and  place 
them  in  running  streams  in  such  a  way  that  the 
water  will  run  in  at  one  end  and  out  at  the  other. 
Into  these  troughs  the  unhusked  coffee  is  poured, 
and  then  it  is  tramped  under  the  feet  of  the 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      89 

cleaners  until  the  husks  are  all  broken  off  and 
float  away  with  the  water.  The  coffee  is  then 
taken  out  and  sacked  and  dried  out  for  shipping. 
This  is  the  only  method  I  ever  saw  in  use  for 
coffee  cleaning. 

Tropical  fruit  is  everywhere  abundant.  The 
bread  fruit  tree  grows  in  Jolo  to  a  great  size. 
The  fruit  is  about  the  size  of  a  cocoanut,  except 
it  is  of  a  flattened  shape.  It  is  covered  by  a 
thin  soft  hull  easily  cut  open  with  an  ordinary 
pocket  knife.  The  first  time  that  I  ever  saw  the 
fruit  I  ate  half  of  one.  I  thought  it  as  good  as 
anything  I  ever  ate.  I  believe  it  will  alone  sus- 
tain life.  Cocoanuts  and  bananas  grow  in  pro- 
fusion. Cocoanuts  are  cut  and  dried,  then  ex- 
ported. Oil  is  manufactured  of  the  dried  cocoa- 
nuts,  which  is  of  excellent  quality.  We  used  it 
to  oil  our  rifles  all  the  time  we  were  stationed 
in  the  Philippines.  Chinese  and  natives  caught 
quantities  of  fish,  which  were  cut  up  and  exposed 
to  the  sun  several  days  to  dry.  The  fish  get 
almost  black  in  this  process  of  drying  and  smell 
badly  before  they  are  dry  enough  to  be  sacked 
and  shipped.  I  saw  a  great  deal  of  this  business, 
but  never  learned  where  it  was  shipped  to  or 
what  use  was  made  of  it. 

Hemp  is  produced  from  a  native  plant  growing 
wild  in  the  forests,  and  looks  something  like  the 
banana  plant.  It  is  baled  and  exported  in  great 
quantities.  IS'atives  bring  in  small  bundles  of  it 
from  the  mountains.  Eed  pepper  grows  abun- 
dantly in  the  woods  on  the  high  and  dry  lands. 
It  grows  on  a  small  bush,  which  is  loaded  with 
the  pods,  which  are  very  strong. 


1 

\ 


90      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

The  natives  in  all  the  islands  make  a  beverage 
of  the  dew  which  collects  in  the  cocoanut  buds. 
This  dew  and  water  stands  in  the  buds  and  is 
collected  early  in  the  day.  It  is  called  tuba,  and 
is  liked  by  all  the  soldiers.  I  drank  but  little  of 
it  I  saw  soldiers  get  drunk  on  it,  and  be  crazy  for 
a  week.  It  is  like  all  other  beverages  of  the 
islands,  but  little  is  necessary  to  make  a  man 
drunk. 

About  twice  every  month  we  went  out  on  a 
practice  march  for  one  day,  only  leaving  about 
one  company  on  guard.  Every  man  would  carry 
his  dinner,  and  have  almost  a  picnic,  enjoying  it 
much  more  than  at  other  times  and  places,  when 
we  would  be  marched  out  in  double  time  several 
miles  and  have  a  hard  fight.  We  went  out  on  these 
practice  marches  up  the  beach  and  returned  across 
the  mountains,  stopping  to  rest  frequently  and 
and  gathering  and  eating  cocoanuts.  If  any 
Morros  were  around  we  would  give  one  a  cent  of 
Mexican  money  to  climb  the  trees  and  get  cocoa- 
nuts  for  us.  The  trees  are  hard  to  climb,  but  a 
Morro  seems  to  climb  them  very  easily.  He  will 
tie  a  piece  of  hemp  just  above  his  ankles  and  go 
right  up  a  tree  by  jumps  until  the  top  is  reached. 
Having  secured  the  cocoanuts  we  would  cut  a 
hole  in  them  and  drink  the  icy  water  in  them. 
This  water  is  very  nice  and  cold,  and  is  particu- 
larly so  to  hot  and  tired  soldiers. 

When  we  would  start  out  on  what  was  a  practice 
march  most  of  the  men  would  think  we  were  going 
out  to  fight,  and  would  not  know  differently  until 
we  returned,  for  it  was  generally  known  only  to 
the  officers  where  we  were  going  or  what  the 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      91 

object  of  the  march  was.  Sometimes  we  would 
have  a  long,  hard  march,  and  always  through  the 
woods  and  forests,  for  there  were  no  roads.  In 
the  forest  marches  we  frequently  chased  monkeys, 
of  which  the  forests  were  full.  We  saw  more 
monkeys  in  Jolo  than  in  any  other  island  we  were 
on.  Sometimes  when  three  or  four  monkeys 
would  discover  us  they  would  make  a  great  noise, 
and,  jumping  from  one  tree  to  another,  keep  in 
one  direction,  and  all  the  monkeys  within  my  hear- 
ing would  join  in  the  procession,  and  keep  up  the 
noise  and  jumping.  The  trees  would  appear  to 
be  full  of  monkeys  over  us,  all  jumping  in  the 
same  direction,  and  making  a  great  noise.  We 
amused  ourselves  and  added  to  their  trouble  by 
throwing  stones  at  them  until  they  passed  out  of 
our  line  of  march,  which  was  frequently  half  an 
hour.  The  wild  ones  are  hard  to  catch.  Young 
ones,  too  young  to  climb  well,  were  easily  caught, 
and  some  were  captured  for  pets. 

Natives  would  catch  them  and  sell  them  to  the 
soldiers. 

The  Sultan  of  Jolo  was  fortified  about  ten 
miles  across  the  mountains  from  Jolo.  He  lived 
in  his  fort  with  his  army.  My  last  practice  march 
was  made  for  the  purpose  of  viewing  the  sultan's 
position,  and  to  know  something  about  his  forces 
if  we  had  to  fight  them.  It  was  about  ten  o'clock 
on  the  morning  of  the  13th  of  May,  1900, 
when  our  commanding  officer  in  great  haste  issued 
orders  to  get  ready  at  once.  We  all  thought  we 
were  going  to  fight  that  time.  We  were  formed 
into  a  battalion  as  hastily  as  possible,  under  the 
commander's   orders,   who   was   present   on   hia 


92      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

charger,  and  directing  everything.  We  were  soon 
moving  out  to  no  one  seemed  to  know  where,  ex- 
cept our  commander.  No  dinner  was  taken  with 
us  this  time,  only  guns  and  as  much  ammunition 
as  we  could  carry.  We  marched  about  five  miles 
before  halting  for  rest.  It  was  very  hot,  and 
several  soldiers  fell  out  overcome  by  the  heat. 
Some  doubtless  fell  out  to  avoid  a  battle,  as  they 
thought.  Two  men  just  before  me,  whom  I  knew 
were  great  cowards,  and  who  feared  that  we  were 
going  into  a  battle,  decided  that  they  could  not 
face  an  enemy.  I  heard  them  talking  about  fall- 
ing out  ten  or  fifteen  minutes.  Their  minds  were 
made  up  to  fall  out  and  avoid  fighting;  one  said 
that  he  would  fall  out  if  the  other  would  stop  to 
take  care  of  him.  This  suited  them  exactly,  and 
out  they  went,  and  were  left  behind.  Our  march 
was  continued  until  we  crossed  the  top  of  the 
mountain,  and  from  the  other  side  we  could  see 
the  sultan's  fort  and  trenches  below  us.  It  was 
then  about  three-  o'clock.  We  rested  and  looked 
at  the  sultan's  fort,  and  looked  over  his  position 
carefully.  This  was  the  object  of  the  com- 
mander in  marching  us  out  there.  He  was  expect- 
ing to  have  to  fight  the  sultan,  and  decided  that 
we  should  see  his  location  and  know  as  much  as 
possible  the  conditions  we  would  have  to  meet 
in  fighting  his  forces.  Eeturning  we  arrived  in 
Jolo  in  the  night. 

Our  commander  expected  the  sultan  to  attack 
our  position,  and  wished  to  know  just  what  to  ex- 
pect of  us,  and  how  quickly  we  could  get  into 
position  to  defend  the  fort.  To  ascertain  this,  and 
also  to  keep  us  in  practice,  a  call  to  arms  was 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      93 

given  every  month,  when  every  man  would  get  out 
and  string  around  to  the  port  holes  in  a  very 
few  minutes.  Every  soldier  went  as  if  he  expected 
to  have  to  fight.  There  were  five  companies  of 
the  Twenty-Third  Kegiment  in  Jolo  while  I  was 
on  duty  there.  Besides  these  one  company  was 
stationed  in  the  Astoria  block  house,  one  com- 
pany at  Seassa  and  one  at  Buanga.  These  com- 
panies did  not  have  as  hard  duty  as  the  com- 
panies in  Jolo,  but  every  three  months  a  com- 
pany was  sent  to  relieve  one  of  these  posts,  and 
the  relieved  company  would  come  into  Jolo,  where 
it  could  have  the  same  duty  and  drill  that  the 
other  companies  had  in  Jolo.  The  companies  at 
each  of  the  three  places  just  mentioned  were  re- 
lieved every  three  months. 

Company  E,  of  which  I  was  a  member,  went  to 
the  Astoria  block  house  about  two  months  before 
we  left  Jolo  and  the  Philippines.  My  company 
was  doing  guard  duty  at  the  block  house  when 
orders  were  received  for  recalling  one  battalion 
of  the  Twenty-Third  Kegiment,  called  the  depot 
battalion,  made  up  of  sick  men  and  those  with 
less  than  six  months'  more  service  under  their 
time  of  enlisting. 

Those  who  had  less  than  six  months  to  serve 
were  given  the  opportunity  to  stay  or  to  return  to 
the  United  States.  I  was  not  slow  to  accept  the 
chance  to  return  and  was  truly  glad  of  the  op- 
portunity. 

The  transport  Warren  came  to  Jolo  for  the 
battalion  on  June  15th.  The  transport  had 
come  by  the  Island  of  Negros  and  Cebu,  and  took 


94      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

on  board  a  battalion  of  soldiers  who  were  going 
to  return  to  the  United  States. 

The  "depot  battalion^'  was  made  up  of  sick 
men  and  those  who  had  short  times.  It  was  sev- 
eral days  before  we  left  Jolo.  The  men  who  were 
going  as  sick  and  disabled  were  examined  by  the 
physician.  Those  he  believed  could  not  endure 
the  climate  long  and  be  able  for  duty,  he  recom- 
mended to  be  returned  to  the  United  States,  and 
those  who  could  endure  the  climate  and  proved  to 
be  healthy,  stayed,  unless  they  were  of  the  class 
of  short-time  soldiers. 

A  man  could  not  stand  the  climate  of  the 
Philippines  many  years  unless  he  was  very  healthy 
and  acquainted  with  tropical  climates. 

I  do  not  believe  the  Philippines  are  a  white 
man's  country.  I  have  heard  doctors  tell  soldiers 
that  if  they  stayed  there,  that  five  or  six  years 
would  be  as  long  as  they  could  live. 

Two  friends  and  I  had  decided  that  when  we 
served  out  our  time  that  we  would  return  to  the 
United  States  by  another  route  than  that  taken 
in  going  over,  and  thus  make  the  trip  around  the 
world.  We  would  go  through  the  Mediterranean 
Sea  to  London  and  then  to  New  York.  But 
when  the  orders  came  that  we  could  return  on 
the  government's  time,  and  by  a  different  route, 
we  decided  at  once  that  we  had  seen  enough  of 
the  world,  and  that  the  route  taken  by  the  trans- 
port would  be  long  enough  for  us,  and  satisfy  our 
thirst  for  travel. 

The  soldiers  who  had  been  taken  on  board  from 
the  islands  of  Negros  and  Cebu  landed  at  Jolo, 
and  went  into  camp,  where  they  remained  for  eight 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      95 

days  awaiting  preparations  of  the  soldiers  at  Jolo. 

I  was  transferred  from  Company  E  to  Com- 
pany K  on  June  18th,  and  with  those  who 
were  returning  to  the  United  States  went  into 
camp  outside  of  the  wall  of  Jolo  in  a  cocoanut 
grove,  where  we  stayed  till  the  twenty-third  day  of 
June,  when  we  boarded  the  transport  Warren 
and  sailed  for  Manila.  Manila  was  reached  on 
the  morning  of  the  twenty-sixth  of  June,  where 
we  stayed  until  the  first  day  of  July.  A  great 
many  soldiers  were  added  on  at  Manila,  many 
wounded  men  and  fifteen  dead  soldiers  were  put 
on  to  carry  back  to  the  United  States,  where  the 
dead  were  sent  to  their  relatives  for  burial. 

While  waiting  a  few  days  for  all  preparations 
to  be  made  I  obtained  a  pass  and  entered  the  city 
for  the  last  time  and  viewed  everything  that  was 
60  familiar  to  me  when  on  duty  there. 

It  was  during  this  short  stop  of  only  a  few  days 
that  we  heard  of  the  trouble  in  China. 

Three  regiments  of  United  States  troops  were 
immediately  ordered  to  China:  the  Sixth,  Ninth 
and  Fourteenth  Infantry  then  at  Manila.  The 
Ninth  Infantry  went  on  board  the  transport 
Hancock,  which  was  lying  alongside  our  transport, 
the  Warren,  and  sailed  just  before  us  on  its  way 
to  China. 

A  rumor  was  circulated  that  our  transport  was 
sailing  to  China,  and  that  we  were  going  there 
for  service.  A  great  many  very  foolishly  believed 
the  report. 

July  first  the  Warren  sailed  from  Manila  bound 
for  San  Francisco.  The  first  day  out  from 
Manila,  late  in  the  evening  when   supper  was 


96      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

eaten,  I  ate  very  heartily,  and  went  on  duty  in 
the  stern  of  the  transport.  The  sea  was  rough, 
and  gave  the  transport  a  rolling  motion.  Shortly 
after  going  on  duty  my  head  commenced  swim- 
ming, and  I  was  ill.  A  soldier  told  me  that  I 
was  sea-sick.  I  had  never  been  sea-sick  and  knew 
nothing  about  how  a  person  felt.  At  last  I 
vomited  freely,  and  in  less  than  an  hour  I  was 
all  right,  except  the  swimming  sensation  of  my 
head,  which  lasted  a  while  longer.  This  little 
experience  was  all  that  I  had  in  going  over  to  the 
Philippines  and  returning  to  the  United  States. 

The  fourth  day  from  Manila  we  arrived  at 
Nagasaki,  Japan.  The  following  morning  the 
transport  was  ready  for  inspection,  the  crew  hav- 
ing worked  most  all  night  preparing  for  it.  Every 
man  on  board  and  everything  had  to  be  inspected 
before  we  were  allowed  to  enter  the  harbor. 
Nagasaki  has  a  fine,  deep  harbor,  where  steamers 
and  war  vessels  coal  and  take  on  supplies.  Many 
large  ships  are  in  the  harbor  at  all  times. 

The  bay  leading  into  the  harbor  is  between  hills 
which  are  almost  entitled  to  the  name  of  moun- 
tains. It  is  apparently  a  hilly  and  rough  coun- 
try to  the  traveler  entering  the  bay  to  Nagasaki. 
On  the  left-hand  side  of  the  bay  on  entering  is 
a  large  marble  monument  standing  on  the  side  of 
the  hill.  This  is  a  monument  in  memory  of 
Japan's  first  king.  Of  course  I  did  not  read 
the  inscription,  it  being  in  Japanese;  but  the 
monument  can  be  seen  at  a  great  distance.  I 
learned  about  it  from  a  resident  of  Nagasaki. 
While  in  Nagasaki  I  also  learned  that  the  Japan- 
ese are  the  hardest  working,  or  rather  the  most 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      9^ 

industrious  people,  and  receive  the  least  compen- 
sation for  their  work  of  any  race  of  people.  Ten 
to  fifteen  cents  per  day  is  the  regular  price  of 
labor.  Several  hundred  are  constantly  emploj^ed 
in  coaling  vessels  that  enter  the  harbor.  The 
coaling  is  done  in  a  peculiar  way.  A  line  of 
men  pass  baskets  filled  with  coal  from  one  to  an- 
other while  the  empty  baskets  are  passed  back  to 
the  place  of  filling  by  a  line  of  children  standing 
close  enough  to  reach  out  one  way  and  get  a  basket 
and  pass  it  on  to  the  next  one  standing  on  the 
other  side;  thus  a  continuous  chain  of  baskets 
is  kept  going  until  the  vessel  is  sufficiently  coaled : 
the  filled  baskets  going  one  way  and  the  empty 
ones  in  the  opposite  direction.  Men,  women  and 
children  all  work.     Apparently  no  one  is  idle. 

The  lot  of  woman  is  extremely  hard.  A  mother 
will  fasten  her  child  to  her  back  and  work  all  day 
with  it  there ;  sometimes  it  is  asleep  and  sometimes 
it  is  yelling,  but  it  is  all  the  same  to  her.  Chil- 
dren there  do  not  receive  the  attention  they  get 
in  America,  but  are  handled  roughly,  and  soon 
have  to  work,  beginning  work  almost  as  soon 
as  they  can  walk. 

Hundreds  of  small  boats,  large  enough  to  carry 
two  or  three  people,  are  always  ready  to  carry 
passengers  to  and  from  the  ships  and  the  landing 
for  ten  cents  (Mexican).  They  are  not  allowed 
to  charge  more. 

These  small  boats  are  provided  with  sides  and 
a  roof  like  a  small  house,  into  which  passengers 
can  go  and  close  the  door. 

When  you  get  ashore  there  are  hundreds  of 
little  vehicles  called  jinrikishas,  which  look  some- 


98      A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

thing  like  baby  carriages  with  only  one  seat 
and  an  umbrella.  The  Japs  will  come  trooping 
around  jabbering  to  you  to  ride.  You  get  in  one 
and  a  Jap  will  get  between  a  small  pair  of  shafts 
and  trot  away  with  you,  and  go  that  way  as  long 
as  you  want  him  to  for  ten  cents  an  hour.  The 
traveler  can  go  anywhere  he  desires  in  one  of 
these  vehicles.  They  do  not  use  hacks  and  vehicles 
as  Americans  do.  I  never  saw  but  one  horse  in 
Nagasaki.  It  was  working  to  a  dray,  and  was 
almost  worked  to  death.  The  Jap^s  back  seems 
to  be  his  most  convenient  method,  and  almost  the 
only  one  he  has,  of  carrying  anything. 

Another  soldier  and  I  walked  through  the  city 
looking  at  everything  we  could  see.  We  soon  dis- 
covered that  almost  every  one  was  poking  fun  at 
us,  all  because  we  were  walking  instead  of  riding 
in  jinrikishas.  It  seems  that  everybody  there  rides 
in  them  everywhere  they  go,  and  it  appears  funny 
to  them  to  see  anyone  walking  the  streets. 
Peddlers  are  the  exceptions,  it  seems,  to  this  rule. 
A  great  many  peddlers  are  seen  walking  the  streets 
to  vend  their  wares,  and  they  have  a  great  many 
articles  that  cannot  be  bought  in  America. 

Every  Japanese  house  has  a  rug  or  carpet  on 
the  floor — these  are  very  nice  articles.  The 
funniest  thing  of  all  is  the  custom  of  stopping 
everybody  at  the  door  and  have  them  take  off 
their  shoes  before  entering  the  house.  They  will 
not  allow  any  one  to  enter  their  houses  without 
pulling  off  his  shoes.  The  reason  of  this,  to  my 
mind,  is  the  fact  that  the  rugs  and  carpets  are 
made  from  grass  and  are  very  heavy,  and  catch 
dirt  very  easily. 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.      90 


CHAPTER  XII. 

The  Japanese  are  industrious,  good  natured 
and  friendly  people.  They  treat  every  one  kindly, 
and  every  one  invited  us  to  go  into  his  house  and 
chat  awhile.  Our  greatest  difficulty  was  to  under- 
stand them.  They  appeared  to  be  anxious  to  do 
anything  they  could  for  us,  and  considering  every- 
thing as  I  could  see  it  in  our  short  stay,  I  believe 
I  would  like  to  live  among  them. 

A  great  many  Europeans  are  residents  of 
Nagasaki.  It  is  a  fine  town,  a  great  deal  of 
business  is  done  there.  The  city  is  spread  out 
along  the  bay  back  of  the  city,  and  all  around 
the  bay,  except  the  entrance  to  it,  are  large  hills, 
and  on  these  a  great  many  large  guns  are  mounted. 
These  natural  barriers  enable  the  Japanese  to 
make  the  city  a  strongly  fortified  place.  The 
government  of  Japan  is  good.  Laws  are  rigid  and 
strictly  enforced.  Theft  is  regarded  as  a  very 
grave  crime,  and  is  punished  with  severe  penalties. 

Men  with  whom  I  talked  in  Nagasaki  seemed  to 
desire  to  leave  the  impression  that  Japan  was  well 
prepared  for  war,  in  fact  better  prepared  than  most 
any  other  country. 

The  transport  Warren  sailed  from  Nagasaki 
July  ninth  for  San  Francisco,  taking  the  northern 


100    A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

route  of  the  Pacific  Ocean.  This  route  is  claimed 
to  be  about  two  thousand  miles  longer  than  the 
southern  route  over  which  we  sailed  in  going  to 
Manila.  The  ocean  currents  and  winds  make  a 
great  deal  of  difference  in  which  route  a  vessel  is 
sailing  in,  and  the  northern  and  southern  routes 
give  the  advantage  to  the  vessels.  Ships  go  the 
southern  route  from  San  Francisco  to  Manila  and 
return  the  northern  route. 

After  a  few  days  out  from  Nagasaki  we  found 
colder  water,  which  continued  most  of  the  way 
to  San  Francisco,  only  getting  warmer  a  short 
distance  from  San  Francisco.  After  getting  out 
into  this  cold  water  the  temperature  of  the  atmos- 
phere also  fell,  and  every  man  who  had  an  overcoat 
or  even  a  heavy  uniform  put  it  on.  Those  who 
had  only  the  thin  uniforms  called  khaki  worn  in 
the  Philippines,  suffered  from  cold. 

It  was  cold  and  disagreeable  for  all  on  board 
except  the  officers,  who,  as  usual,  fared  well  at  all 
times  and  in  all  places. 

There  was  a  casual  detachment  of  discharged 
soldiers  numbering  one  hundred  and  thirty-eight 
on  board,  two  hundred  and  forty-one  officers  and 
privates  of  the  Twenty-third  Eegiment,  sixty 
prisoners  and  twenty-one  passengers,  a  total  of  four 
hundred  and  sixty  men  on  board  besides  the  crew. 
The  transport  Warren  is  a  large  vessel,  and  all 
on  board  had  plenty  of  room. 

Those  men  who  were  not  thoughtful  enough  to 
start  back  to  the  United  States  with  their  heavy 
uniforms  looked  somewhat  pitiful  crowding  around 
the  engine  rooms  and  boilers,  and  getting  anywhere 
that  offered  some  protection  from  the  chilly  air 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.     101 

and  sea  breeze.  I  was  fortunate  in  not  being  one 
of  that  number.  I  had  plenty  of  warm  clothing 
and  fared  well  returning.  I  was  on  the  lookout 
for  myself,  and  provided  myself  with  everything 
I  desired,  and  had  to  call  on  no  one  for  anything. 
My  rule  was  to  look  out  for  myself  all  the  time  I 
was  in  the  army,  and  usually  I  had  everything  I 
desired.  If  I  wanted  anything  to  use  I  always 
went  where  I  could  buy  it,  and  never  borrowed 
from  the  soldiers. 

I  always  thought  that  was  a  good  rule  for  a 
soldier;  I  noticed  that  those  who  did  that  fared 
much  better  than  those  who  did  not  practice  that 
rule. 

I  never  liked  to  loan  my  gun  and  belt  to  a  sol- 
dier when  he  has  all  those  things  of  his  own.  But 
some  soldiers  would  keep  their  guns  polished  and 
oiled,  and  set  them  away  and  borrow  guns  and  belts 
from  other  soldiers  to  do  guard  duty  with.  These 
received  the  appellation  of  "orderly  buckers"  by 
their  comrades,  and  were  too  lazy  to  walk  post 
and  perform  a  soldier's  duty.  Duty  on  the  trans- 
port in  returning  to  the  United  States  was  very 
hard  on  those  soldiers  who  were  well.  Almost 
every  soldier  was  on  the  sick  report,  and  called 
by  the  soldiers  the  sick  battalion.  The  few  who 
were  put  on  duty  had  it  to  perform  every  other 
night.  I  was  one  of  the  latter,  and  I  considered 
it  pretty  tough  too.  Cooks  on  the  transports 
were  assigned  for  one  year  to  cook  for  the  sol- 
diers. They  were  as  filthy  as  hogs  with  every- 
thing they  cooked.  They  cared  nothing  about 
how  the  rations  were  prepared  nor  how  nasty 
they  werC;  just  so  the  cooking  was  over  with  as 


102    A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

quickly  as  possible.  They  had  no  sympathy ;  any- 
thing seemed  to  the  cooks  good  enough  if  it  did 
not  poison  him.  On  our  return  we  had  plenty  to 
eat  if  it  had  been  cooked  decently  so  that  men 
could  eat  it.  The  reader  may  say  that  it  should 
have  been  reported  to  the  officer  in  command. 
This  was  done,  and  reported  also  to  the  officer  of 
the  day,  and  the  next  day  after  the  reports  were 
made  we  were  given  cabbage  for  dinner,  and 
every  man  founds  big  worms  in  his  plate  of  cab- 
bage. While  the  officer  of  the  day  was  passing 
by  one  soldier  had  the  nerve  to  show  him  what 
was  on  his  plate;  immediately  the  officer  of  the 
day  went  to  the  cooks  about  it  and  that  seemed 
to  end  it.  One  soldier  found  something  in  his 
plate  that  looked  almost  like  a  tarantula. 

Some  of  the  officers  and  a  great  many  privates 
had  a  monkey  apiece.  Great  care  was  taken  of 
them  by  their  owners.  Two  large  monkeys  be- 
longed to  some  of  the  crew.  These  and  the 
smaller  ones  had  the  whole  vessel  to  run  through 
and  nothing  escaped  them — they  were  into  every- 
thing. Finally  the  commanding  officer  gave 
orders  for  all  the  monkeys  to  be  taken  up,  but 
the  order  was  not  carried  out  and  he  had  the 
doctor  chloroform  the  two  large  ones  and  throw 
them  overboard.  That  .made  the  crew  very  mad 
and  sounded  the  death  knell  to  all  the  monkeys 
on  board. 

That  night  the  crew  very  quietly  caught  every 
monkey  and  threw  them  overboard — ^not  one  es- 
caped. It  was  then  the  officers'  turn  to  be  mad 
and  they  did  everything  they  could  to  learn  who 
destroyed  their  monkeys.    One  old  captain  who 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.     103 

had  lost  a  monkey  offered  a  reward  of  ten  dol- 
lars to  know  who  threw  his  monkey  overboard, 
but  he  failed  to  find  out  who  it  was.  I  never 
heard  such  a  fuss  about  as  small  a  thing  as  a 
monkey  before. 

We  arrived  within  one  or  two  miles  of  the 
Golden  Gate  on  July  30.  The  transport  stopped 
and  the  v/histle  was  blown  for  the  quarantine 
officers  and  a  pilot.  We  could  not  see  land,  the 
fog  was  so  heavy,  until  we  got  to  the  Golden 
Gate.  The  sight  of  land  sent  a  thrill  of  glad- 
ness through  every  one  on  board,  especially  the 
soldiers  who  were  beholding  their  own  country, 
where  they  were  soon  to  be  discharged,  and  once 
more  be  free  to  go  and  come  at  their  own  pleas- 
ure. Just  before  night  we  went  to  the  quaran- 
tine station  on  Angel  Island  and  remained  until 
morning,  when  everything  was  taken  off  the 
transport.  On  the  first  of  August  we  went 
ashore  at  the  Presidio  wharf,  landing  in  the  even- 
ing. 

We  were  not  received  as  royally  as  we  had  de- 
parted, no  big  reception  was  awaiting  us,  although 
I  am  quite  sure  the  soldiers  would  have  enjoyed 
one  as  much  as  when  they  were  departing  for  the 
Philippines.  I  suppose  it  was  thought  that  when 
we  went  away  that  we  would  never  get  back. 

When  we  boarded  the  transport  for  the  Philip- 
pines several  thousand  enthusiastic  people  wit- 
nessed our  departure  and  a  great  display  of  patri- 
otism was  manifested.  When  that  portion  which 
returned  when  I  did  were  landing  only  one  woman 
and  a  little  boy  were  present  to  show  any  feeling 
of  rejoicing  that  we  had  not  all  perished  in  the 


104    A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

\ 

I  Philippines  from  the  awful  climate  and  the  Fili- 
\  pino  bullets.  This  great  patriotic  display  being 
I  over  we  went  into  camps  at  Presidio  and  remained 
there  to  rest  and  await  further  orders,  which  came 
in  a  few  days,  as  soon  as  arrangements  for  trans- 
portation over  the  railroad  could  be  made;  and 
then  Companies  I  and  L  went  to  Fort  Douglas, 
Salt  Lake  City,  Companies  K  and  M  were  assigned 
to  ZPoit  D.  A.  Kussell,  Cheyenne,  Wyoming. 
August  sixth  we  left  San  Francisco  and  arrived 
at  Fort  D.  A.  Kussel  in  the  evening  of  August 
ninth.  Companies  K  and  M  were  under  the  com- 
mand of  Captain  Delair,  who  is  a  good  officer. 
Captain  Devore  had  command  of  Company  K,  to 
which  I  then  belonged  and  I  remained  with  that 
company  until  discharged. 

Captain  Devore  was  a  very  good  old  religious 
kind  of  an  officer,  very  strange  and  different  from 
any  other  officer.  The  most  that  he  believed  in 
was  to  keep  clean.  He  was  very  fond  of  seeing 
brooms,  mops,  picks  and  shovels  in  use.  He  liked 
to  see  work  going  on.  He  seemed  to  be  too  eco- 
nomical to  eat  as  much  as  he  needed  of  govern- 
ment rations.  He  would  never  allow  any  of  the 
company^s  funds  to  be  spent  for  any  purpose,  but 
was  all  the  time  adding  to  the  fund. 

The  company  was  allowed  twenty  pounds  of 
sugar  every  ten  days.  Of  this  Captain  Devore 
would  take  off  one  pound  for  company  funds. 
This  is  only  one  example,  or  illustration,  of  many 
ways  of  adding  something  to  the  funds  of  the 
company. 

The  company  cook  was  preparing  prunes  one 
day  for  dinner  when  the  old  captain  came  around 


A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines.    105 

inspecting  everything;  the  cook  told  him  that  he 
was  cooking  prunes.  The  cook  was  then  asked  how 
the  men  liked  them,  to  which  he  was  answered 
that  the  men  would  eat  all  that  were  being  cooked 
and  then  not  have  more  than  half  enough.  The 
pld  captain  said  there  were  too  many  for  the  com- 
pany— that  six  was  enough  for  anyone.  He 
further  said,  "I  don't  eat  but  two  or  three  and  that 
is  as  many  as  I  want." 

The  company  was  always  kicking  about  him. 
He  was  never  pleased  on  inspection  to  find  some- 
thing cooking.  He  liked  to  find  the  stove  cold 
and  the  cooking  vessels  all  clean,  then  everything 
with  him  was  0.  K.  He  would  give  a  man  who 
had  had  a  number  of  summary  court  martials  an 
"excellent"  discharge  and  some  soldiers  who  were 
good  duty  soldiers  and  never  had  a  court  martial 
would  get  "only  good."  I  have  noticed  that  if  he 
likes  a  soldier  he  will  always  get  "excellemt."  He 
seemed  never  to  be  governed  by  a  soldier's  record. 
I  had  "very  good,"  all  I  cared  for,  as  I  was  so 
happy  to  get  it. 

I  left  the  army  November  11,  1900,  en  route  to 
Dallas,  Texas,  where  I  remained  a  few  days  and 
went  to  Pleasant  Point,  where  I  spent  several 
days  with  two  of  my  brothers,  John  H.  and  Juney 
H.  Freeman.  Here  I  met  many  friends  whom 
I  had  known  before  enlisting  in  the  army  and 
again  I  was  free  to  join  them  in  their  sports  as  I 
had  done  before. 

December  twentieth,  I  started  back  to  Georgia. 
I  took  the  route  via  New  Orleans,  at  which  place 
I  stopped  about  thirty  hours  and  took  another  look 


106    A  Soldier  in  the  Philippines. 

at  the  old  town.  I  wanted  to  look  at  it  once  more 
and  compare  it  to  the  time  when  I  was  in  camps 
there.  I  satisfied  myself  and  proceeded  on  my 
homeward  journey  to  the  old  red  hills  of  Georgia, 
which  I  had  left  five  years  and  two  months  before. 


THE  END. 


3 


1        A        ^     ^^     ^     l^ 


>, 


RETURN  TO  the  circulation  desk  of  any 
University  of  California  Library 

or  to  the 

NORTHERN  REGIONAL  LIBRARY  FACILITY 
BIdg.  400,  Richmond  Field  Station 
University  of  California 
Richmond,  CA  94804-4698 

ALL  BOOKS  MAY  BE  RECALLED  AFTER  7  DAYS 

•  2-month  loans  may  be  renewed  by  calling 
(510)642-6753 

•  1-year  loans  may  be  recharged  by  bringing 
books  to  NRLF 

•  Renewals  and  recharges  may  be  made 
4  days  prior  to  due  date 

DUE  AS  STAMPED  BELOW 

SENT  ON  ILL 

OCT  1  3  2006 


U.C.  BERKELEY 


1Y 
DO 


DD20   12M   1-05 


U.C.BERKELEY  LIBRARIES 


CD^4ElbfiED 


